Càrmen Ozana de Melo

The changes occurring in Brazilian agriculture, mainly from the end of the 60-ies, characterized a redefinition of the relationships between agriculture and industry, so originating a new agricultural production pattern. In Paraná State, this passage to the dynamic agriculture was greatly responsible for the modernization and expansion process of agriculture and livestock, mainly from the 70-ies. The Paraná agricultural sector interfered into the modernization process, by showing significant changes in its productive structure. The technological innovations were responsible for the change in the production line in order to improve the competitiveness and set the state in prominence, when showing expressive results of its agriculture and livestock. Although those changes were not homogenous, they showed a tendency to regional diffusion. They caused a deep transformation in rural social organization with economical and social consequences. In this context, this study was carried out to analyze the rural development of the Paraná counties, and specifically to verify the rural development index (IDR), as well as to identify the decisive aspects of the rural development and to classify the counties according to the rural development level. Taking into account the multidimensional character of the development concept, the technique of the multivariate statistical analysis or more specifically the factorial analysis was used. The model-applied analysis for the year 2000 made possible the extraction of five factors with characteristic root higher than unit that together explain 66.17% of the total variance in selected variables. The F1 factor show to be more related to those variables related to education, labor, electric power and financial resources. The F2 factor showed to be more associate to the contingent of people living in the rural medium and to their activities concerning to studies, cropping, migration and housing conditions. In factor F3, the predominating variables are the agricultural work productivity and agricultural county income per capita. The factor F4 showed to be positive and strongly related to the indicators: land productivity and specialization soybean production. The last factor under consideration (F5) showed to be more related with the indicators: demographic density and nominal wage in the agriculture and livestock. The average IDR was 43.63, from which the categories of rural development were defined. According to classification, six counties showed a too much high development level. In the second category, other seven counties are distinguished as very high ones. A total of 50 counties showed a high development level. These 63 counties represent 15.79% from the total Paraná counties. One hundred sixteen counties are classified at the average development level, that is, 29.07% from the total. Thus, it is important to emphasize that most counties (220 or 55,14%) are under the categories: low, very low, and too much low rural development. These results let to appear that the regional inequalities in Paraná State are also shown in relation to the rural population conditions. The analysis at the county level shows that these inequalities are repeated and, sometimes, are intensified inside the mesoregions. This analysis allows to conclude for the heterogeneity of situations in a state where the agriculture modernization process was spread, by alerting for the specificities that should be taken into account. The results of the factors indicate some aspects that should be intensively worked towards the improvement of the rural life and the situation of the counties as a consequence. From the principle that the rural is not only agricultural, but a space where the economical and social relationships are developed and where people live, the high number of counties under a low development level demands attention for the rural medium, since the expressive results of the Paraná agriculture and livestock, that places the State in evidence, are not reflected into the rural space.