Contract Farming in South Mozambique: Small outgrower Family Farmers' Perception int the Sugar Value Chain

Abstract

Since the end of the twentieth Century, Mozambique has registered important foreign investments in agriculture, especially in the implantation of agribusiness. In the sugar sector, there were investments in large monoculture companies, and the first transformation supported by a subcontracting system for small family producers with positive, and negative effects in rural areas. The knowledge of perceptions that small out-grower family farmers attribute to their effective experience with these companies is relevant for the consolidation of this form of integration in the market. The study aims to assess the Perceptions of Value that small out-grower family farmers attribute to the relationship they establish with an agribusiness in the production of sugarcane in the sugar value chain. The study was carried out applying Confirmatory Factor Analysis to a reduced version of a scale of values, which relates four constructs underlying the concept of value. The results indicate that the judgment evaluated by the small out-grower family farmers is multidimensional focused on utilitarian (performance/cost), emotional and social aspects, with a greater magnitude of monetary dimension (cost). The study highlights the significance of cognitive/economic judgment as a crucial factor in the creation of relational value in farming context and of dependence of affective and social aspects on the utilitarian aspects of the relationship. In this study, the concept of Perceived Value, which determines the adequacy of customer/consumer retention/loyalty strategies in the context of consumption, has been extended to the study of a relationship in the context of the provision of agricultural services