Análise dos impactos ocasionados pela transição para modelos de negócios circulares na dinâmica de sucessão familiar em empreendimentos rurais

Abstract

A Circular Economy is an approach that has gained notoriety since 2010. It has reached relevance among the aspects that deal with sustainability due to the notorious engagement of political and economic agents from all continents. Its proposal advocates that new businesses in the design phase observe the maximum appreciation of natural resources and seek to close the circle by adopting asset sharing, waste re-signification, and symbiosis. At the same time, it challenges ongoing productive activities to transition to circular business models. Within the scope of the Circular Economy, the industrial sector achieves greater prominence due to its processing-oriented nature. However, other sectors such as primary production also present development opportunities. In this sense, rural producers, realizing the possibility of moving to the Circular Economy and combining economic and socio-environmental sustainability, seek new knowledge on the subject through congresses, courses, and training in the area. Some individuals walk this journey together with their children, successors of the business, a question that motivates the proposition of the present study, which included research with 30 rural producers who participated in a course that guides the transition to circular business models in agricultural establishments. Initially, three conceptual constructs were formulated from the theoretical basis to guide the data collection. The first deals with the transition to the circular business model and includes verifying the implementation of ten circular practices; the second construct addresses family succession dynamics; the third is associated with the impacts resulting from the transition to the circular business model on the family succession dynamics of the rural enterprises surveyed. The results were analyzed in stages. There were exploratory descriptive statistics, formulation of scores with a combination of variables, application of Cronbach's Alpha, Exploratory Factor Analysis, and Spearman's Test. It was found that when considering the ten circular practices listed, the investigated rural enterprises are in different stages of transition to the Circular Economy, with 27% being at an advanced level (High Quartile). It was noticed that rural producers who included circularity as a strategic element are associated with more advanced transition levels. Regarding the dynamics of family succession, it was found that 33% of the surveyed establishments are at an advanced level (High Quartile), that the transmission of power is programmed to occur when rural producers reach an age between 61 and 71 years and that there is no statistically significant correlation between the succession plan and the main manager's temporal expectation regarding the business. As the main result, it was identified that most rural producers perceived positive impacts on the dynamics of family succession caused by the transition of the business model, but that this finding did not obtain a statistically significant correlation.