Os turmeiros no agronegócio canavieiro: mediadores dos trabalhadores migrantes e da usina.

Abstract

The sugarcane agribusiness is characterized by the exploitation of temporary migrant workforce. These workers are peasants, who in the face of insecurity and instability in accessing land, seek in the external work a way to reproduce their lives. In this process, the recruitment of labor is done through mediators, called turmeiros that establish the link between workers and the cane mills. The proposal of this study was to investigate how is this character in this scenario and what are the strategies used for the selection and hiring of employees. The purpose of this dissertation is to analyze the social and economic transformations of the city of Pindaí-BA and the impacts on the reproduction of living conditions of peasant workers seeking temporary migration. So, attempts were made to identify how the turmeiro is defined, whose responsibility is to recruit workers in the setting of temporary migration. We also analyze how does the selection and hiring of temporary migrant workers made by turmeiros. It is a qualitative research that sought to combine the ethnographic observation techniques (space of coexistence and events at the source), using the diary, interviews with workers, family and turmeiros, and analysis of statistical data. The conclusion of this research is that turmeiros, mediating agents are figures that, despite receiving a different role of other workers, being responsible to internalize and disseminate the rules and cane mill values in order to conduct an obedient and disciplined worker. It is also part of a scenario of labor exploitation. The research also contributes to present the punishments that cane mills establish for workers who do not finish the harvest by relegating them to be excluded from new selection processes.