On the margins of soy farms : traditional populations and selective environmental policies in the Brazilian Cerrado
Résumé
In the Cerrado, the expansion of soybean cultivation since the 1990s has coincided with
the strengthening of environmental regulations. We analyze how the two main
environmental policies – Protected Areas and the Forest Code – have played out at the
ground level in western Bahia state. These policies in Cerrado have not been designed
to curb the expansion of this agricultural frontier. These norms have, on the contrary,
accommodated this expansion because the way environmental managers selectively
choose environmental problems and publicize them through specific information
systems depreciates traditional fire-dependent production systems. These ‘politics of
selection’ are likely to increase competition for resources in the margins of soybean
agriculture, which is where traditional populations have now become confined.