Use of business models in family farming as a tool to help access markets: cocoa producers in the Macará region, Ecuador

Abstract

The family representation of agriculture plays an important role in the sustainability of the planet's food by opposing the concentrative model that disseminates social inequality and environmental production. To this end, traditional family members, as well as traditional peoples, resort to other arrangements and marketing their products, inserting themselves into social constructions of markets that value trust, trust and the commercialization of their products. It is in this sense that this article aims to analyze how cocoa producers in the micro-region of Macará, in the province of Loja, Ecuador, access markets. To this end, the Canvas tool of business models adapted to family farmers and the notion of markets as a social construction was used. As a result, it was observed that producers access proximity markets and local and territorial markets through direct sales on the property, local deliveries, events and local fairs. It was also verified, the emphasis on the aggregation of value of its products through the preparation techniques, family work and the issue of food health. Furthermore, environmental-represented and presented in the daily lives of producers and from construction to the construction and value models of market circuits.