Fruit culture growth in Northeast Brazil and its relationship with work

Abstract

Fruit growing in Brazil enhances regional development, as it generates income and absorbs local labor. The Brazilian Northeast presents ideal edaphoclimatic conditions for the development of several fruit trees, mainly in irrigated areas. The objective was to analyze the educational level and the relationship between the wages of men and women employed in the fruit sector in the Northeast region of Brazil. Thus, constituting historical series obtained from SIDRA-IBGE. The selected crops were coconut, mango and grape between the years 2001 to 2018; literacy rate and level of education in Brazil and the northeast region, the relationship between male and female genders, percentage of women in formal jobs in the years 2004 to 2015 and average monthly income in Brazil and the Northeast region and male and female genders in the years 2012 to 2015. There was a reduction in the area cultivated with coconut, however, in mango and grape cultures there was no increase in the area. Regarding the harvested area, the coconut-da-baia crop has a larger cultivated area, however, this area has been gradually reduced. In mango and grape crops, no variations were detected in the harvested areas. As for the average production, the grape crop has higher productivity. In the percentage of formal jobs, literacy and level of schooling of women both at national and regional level, there was a linear growth and higher than that of men, however there was a discrepancy in salary between genders even though women had a higher level of schooling.