Limitations on Environmental Responsibility in the Western Bahia Agrobusiness

Abstract

The present study examined the limitations on the role of associations responsible for the agribusiness segment in Western Bahia as regards issues that affect the region in their social, environmental and economic dimensions. It was a multiple-case, qualitative, descriptive and exploratory study, in which the limitations of responsible performance of each association were analyzed from the contrast between what has been done in the field of actions/projects, raised through interviews with managers of associations and documentary research, and the major issues affecting the region in its dimensions, identified from the questionnaires to social workers and documentary research. The results show that none of these associations have any initiative to address the problems of all dimensions examined, and none of the identified initiatives cater fully to any area of any of these dimensions. It appears also that the set of limitations around the responsible performance of organizations is subject to the form of development that has subsidized expressive performance of the sector and allowed for the proliferation of a range of social and environmental problems that reveal the unsustainability of the region over time.