By MARCONI SEVERO*
From the language of agriculture or why is agriculture what it is?
The presence of agribusiness in major newspapers is not uncommon. In general, it can be classified into two categories: one in which the sector is directly responsible for the discourse, such as in advertising campaigns and thematic news (congresses, fairs, etc.), and one in which the sector itself is the object of the discourse. To understand agribusiness, it is necessary to master both representations: the first refers to how the sector imagines itself and how it wants to be seen; the second concerns the reception and influence of the first, and it is to this that we will focus.
The material to be analyzed consists of a report published by the newspaper Mail Braziliense, which focuses on female representation in agribusiness. More than the issue of sex/gender, we will analyze its discursive construction, focusing on its associations, ambiguities and scope. This is an emblematic case, as it is frequently used in the mainstream media, which allows us to analyze not only the “language of agriculture”, but also the reason for its social, economic and political prominence, as it highlights the deep relationship between its universalizing representations and the mainstream media.
As I have argued in other analyses, a significant part of the power of agribusiness comes from its linguistic and, by extension, legal and cultural performance. Its proximity to the standard norm of the Portuguese language, used in the legal and political spheres, combined with its foundation in objective reality, gives the language of agribusiness enormous power of persuasion, to the point of being used naturally in situations that, not infrequently, even include its critics and opponents (as is the case here).
In terms of content, the report in question highlights the diversity of activities carried out by women involved in agribusiness, ranging from cattle farming to crafts, including floriculture and vegetable growing. Here we have the first contradiction. Firstly, the text does not mention whether it is beef or dairy cattle farming, which suggests that the person who wrote it does not have a grasp of the technical differences used in rural areas (something to be expected, given that this is a text produced in urban areas).
In any case, judging by the activities, people who are dedicated to activities that characterize different audiences, if not declared opponents, were included as participants in agribusiness: while cattle farming is an activity characteristic of medium and large properties, therefore typical of agribusiness, crafts, floriculture and vegetable growing constitute frequent activities among small farmers, many of whom are directly or indirectly linked to popular social movements, therefore to the main critics and opponents of agribusiness.
Since the text uses conventional patterns of language and expression (hence its empirical importance), it is not surprising that it fails to observe the distinctions that are important to the different actors, groups and classes present in the Brazilian rural social space. This explains the peculiar use of categories that, to the general public, can go completely unnoticed. Let us take an example. The first interviewee is a “rural producer” who works “in the family farming system” in a “settlement”.
Well, if she is a rural producer, then she is part of agribusiness. This is what this category presupposes, on which the sector's discourse is based. Or would she be a family farmer, since she works in this “system”? Or, even, a settler, therefore someone potentially linked to popular social movements, which sometimes oppose family farmers, called by the former “agribusiness”, and always agribusiness?
It is unlikely, if not impossible, to classify the same person into three distinct profiles, especially when there is at least one opposition among them. The sequence of the text, however, is enlightening: the interviewee belongs to the group of small farmers. But how did we arrive at this conclusion? Well, because in addition to being settled, she produces agroecological fruit and vegetables that are sold locally, which is characteristic of popular social movements.
The question is: will the general public be able to understand this? Will they be able to read between the lines something that the text itself seems to ignore? Or will they follow the textual orientation and conclude that this woman is part of the agribusiness, as the headline already suggests? The latter option is obviously the most likely. But let's not jump to conclusions. Let's return to the text.
After addressing the case of another “rural producer”, followed by the statement of an extensionist from the Technical Assistance and Rural Extension Company – Emater-DF, the text goes on to problematize “gender inequality in agriculture”, based on a survey carried out by the Agroligadas Movement in partnership with the Brazilian Agribusiness Association – Abag.
Note that the emphasis explicitly returns to agribusiness, as suggested by the expression “gender in agriculture”, the mention of the Agroligadas Movement, “a movement formed by women linked to agribusiness”, according to its website official, and to Abag, the main institution in the sector. However, what appears to be a resumption of this perspective abruptly returns to the guidelines that characterize precisely its opponents.
This is what is suggested by the statement, which is questioned immediately afterwards, by a university professor who, apparently, shares a very common opinion among her peers, since she “praises” women who “fight against land grabbing, real estate speculation, monoculture and the use of pesticides”. Finally, the report emphasizes that this professional, whose speech aims to give an academic-scientific aspect to the text, sees the “agroecological notebook” as an alternative to “scale the production” of “family and peasant farmers”.
In short, what we have here is a set of positions and stances that are against agribusiness. Firstly, agroecology, popular agrarian reform and peasantry constitute the three main agendas that characterize popular social movements in their struggle against agribusiness. Here too, there is an interesting conceptual confusion. Peasants, a category that does not exist in the mainstream media and whose mobilization is extremely specific and ambiguous, are present side by side with family farmers in a situation that not only ignores the existing boundaries between the two but also places them, despite explicit criticism, as parts of agribusiness.
Once again, we must ask: does the reader know that land grabbing, real estate speculation, monoculture and the use of pesticides are accusations leveled at agribusiness? Or is it more likely that he or she will only identify points that should be combated, and fought by women in agribusiness? The latter option is undoubtedly the most likely. But let us return to the text.
Immediately afterwards, the text highlights the public policies promoted by the Ministry of Agrarian Development and Family Farming (MDA), which “were only possible thanks to the mobilization of social movements”. After mentioning some actions, the text ends with a mention of the Rural Women’s Productive and Economic Organization Program, which aims to “provide support for the structuring of productive activities, product marketing, management and access to credit and marketing policies”. Therefore, according to a rationale typical of agribusiness, despite having been developed in conjunction with its opponents.
The most interesting thing, however, is what we could call, with René Magritte, image betrayal: below a title in which the word “Agro” appears prominently, there is a woman wearing a T-shirt of the Landless Workers Movement – MST.
Image 1: Visual reproduction of the report, focusing on the title and main image.
Not only is the text/image opposition blatant, it also acts to the detriment of the MST, since it appears to be supported by the “Agro” sector. But what is even more interesting is that all this can go unnoticed, since it was coherently elaborated in a speech aimed at the general public, which is all the more curious when we know that it was not directly elaborated by the sector.
It is possible that at this point the reader may have the impression that the text is of dubious quality: quite the opposite, it was very well written, to the point of covering up all the points made, which is why I recommend reading it from now on. I recommend it all the more considering the two proposed readings: the one that the text naturally requires and the one that I propose here. The first unknowingly mobilizes the language of agribusiness in a discourse that is fully favorable to it; the second seeks to demystify the first in what is most unthinkable about it.
Thus, because it has absorbed the representations of the sector, such as the one in which “agriculture” and rural social space are taken as synonyms, the text does nothing more than reproduce them in their most effective and efficient form, that is, by naturalizing them. The contradictions are many, and to perceive them it is necessary to have a sociologically attentive eye, which is why they may go unnoticed by the lay reader, especially when it deals with a topic imbued with good faith, such as the importance of women in rural areas.
Agribusiness is what it is precisely because its language, and therefore its cultural representations, differ little from that used by individuals in their daily lives, which means that it has complicities that are not always seen as such. The simple contrast of the MST being seen as part of agribusiness, according to an interpretation that is apparently not engaged, speaks for itself, and demonstrates the depth and scope of the sector's representations within Brazilian society.
This is why it is necessary to understand them not only for what they mean, but for what people think they mean (as illustrated by the exemplary case of the figure of the peasant, often opposed to that of the rural producer), and only then to take a position or action that is truly consistent with their practices and representations. And this is true from both an epistemological and a political point of view.
*Marconi Severo holds a PhD in Social Sciences from the Federal University of Santa Maria (UFSM).
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