Fragile Lands of Latin America Strategies for ... - PART - USAID

Extractive Reserves
Income Generation, Social Structure, and Surplus
Accumulation on the Ser ingal
Two central points emerge from our survey. First, the population of
the seringal has been able to maintain itself on this or other seringais
in the region over a long period of time. Second the mixed economy
of the rubber tappers produces a surplus on the seringal itself, not
counting the surplus obtained from the commercialization of rubber
latex, and does so without degrading the natural resource base.
The population of Seringal Cachoeira is predominantly Acrean-
85% percent of the families surveyed are from Acre, and 60% from the
municipality of Xapuri. The average time of residence on the holding
was 11 years, and some 30% of the residents have been on the same
holding for more than 15 years. In comparative regional terms this is
a very stable population (Wood and Wilson 1984). In terms of income,
an average family produces 750 kg of rubber and 325 latas (or 4,500
kg) of Brazil nuts per year, with a combined gross cash value of about
U.S. $9602 and the upper 30% of the households surveyed had annual
incomes from rubber and Brazil nut extraction of over U.S. $1,500.
This calculation excludes housing material, fodder, fruit, and increase
in small livestock herds, as well as income generated in the most
prosperous households through commercial transactions. To put this in
regional context, 50% of the economically active population in 1980 in
the Brazilian Amazon (North) region eamed slightly less than one
minimum salary per month (IBGE 1984), whereas the population in
our survey eamed almost two minimum monthly salaries.
There is, however, an internal social stratification in the seringal;
some of the oldest, largest and wealthiest holdings are occupied by
rubber tappers who are also petty merchants, the first in the chain of
middlemen who buy and sell rubber and Brazil nuts and exchange
merchandise on credit. These middlemen, and other urban residents,
advance goods and cash against future rubber product ion. A1 though
the traditional company store system under which rubber tappers were
tied to a single patron for all transactions has ended on Cachoeira, as
on most estates in the region (rubber tappers are free to commercialize
their products where they can), many rubber tappers are in debt to
middlemen. This may be reflected by our observation that about 55%
of our sample households had a cash deficit at the time of our survey
of about $350 per family. However, 44% of the sample had a cash
surplus of an average of $680. A key question is whether this difference
in financial performance is significant, and if so, what factors explain
the difference.