Between paths and life strategies: the importance of the Programa Nacional de Crédito Fundiário on Access to Land by rural youth in the State of Espírito Santo

Abstract

: Which is the importance and meaning that has the land to the young beneficiaries of the Programa Nacional de Crédito Fundiário - PNCF (“national program for land credit”)? This is the question that this paper seeks to answer when interviewing rural youth who accessed the PNCF in the state of Espirito Santo - Brazil. The theoretical approach adopted in this article and the narratives of young people interviewed allowed perceiving different trajectories and living conditions that guide and give different meanings to their condition to access the land and their possibilities to continue in the countryside. On the other hand, also with the feeling of the meaning attributed the condition of possession and ownership of land, the access to governmental credit (PNCF) fits as strategies of choice and adaptation, or reaction and need. For this research seven rural youth associations in two small country towns were interviewed with the highest number of projects within the seal Nossa Primeira Terra – NPT (“our first land”) of PNCF in the state of Espirito Santo. The interviews showed that access to land is the key factor of young people to remain in the field.