Apropriação das águas, Matopiba e territorialização do agronegócio no Oeste da Bahia: as águas sem fronteiras de Correntina.

Abstract

The appropriation of land, territories and natural resources is an element that marks the 'development' of Brazilian agriculture since the colonial time. In West Bahia, the intensification of monopoly and external control of land and natural resources is driven by the process of expanding borders and modernizing agriculture, especially since the 1980s, which culminates in the consolidation and territorialization of agribusiness in the region from the 2000s. More recently, with the 2008 crisis, it is perceived the intensification of the appropriation of lands, waters and natural resources process, with the perspective of commodity production for the global market. The analyzes supported by the land grabbing and water grabbing concepts state that after the 2008 financial, alimentary (food price inflation) and energy crisis, there is a significant expansion in demand for land, water and natural resources in countries exporters of primary genres, such as Brazil, which eventually warms the land market, including on a global scale, and causes an increase in the price of land-related assets, such as water. This context manifests specificities with the implementation of the Matopiba PDA (Portuguese for Agricultural Development Plan of Matopiba), which represents, in West Bahia, a “new” cycle of border expansion. It has a fundamental support in the appropriation of water, since this region is located in the Cerrado - the main water reserve of the country. In this sense, the present work aimed to analyze the role of water appropriation by agribusiness companies in their territorialization in the Cerrado biome of West Bahia, considering mainly the period of implementation of the Matopiba PDA (2015-2018). For this, it was used as a case study the city of Correntina, Bahia, seeking to identify the main strategies used by companies to appropriate the water, understanding how agribusiness uses these strategies in the process of construction of water control, what the main interests involved are, and the conflicts provoked. In addition, it was possible to analyze the interface between water appropriation, territorial appropriation, border expansion and agribusiness territorialization in the region under study