Fidelização de cooperados: uma análise a partir do envolvimento econômico e social

Abstract

In recent years the share of agribusiness in the Brazilian GDP has been close to 25%, besides representing 45% of the country's exports. Within this scenario, the agricultural cooperatives have relevant representation, participating with about 48% of the national food production and with 11% of the Brazilian agricultural and livestock GDP. However, cooperatives are only strong, both economically and socially, thanks to the participation of their members. In this context, one of the major problems that concern cooperatives is the loyalty of their members. In the search for the answers that lead the associates to practice these acts, this research aimed to investigate which aspects influence the fidelity of the associates, analyzing the economic involvement, that are of those members that most transact with the cooperative and the social and participative involvement of the members in the cooperative's environment. For that, we used exploratory and descriptive methodological procedures, with qualitative and quantitative data, obtained through a case study of the Cooperativa Agropecuária de Produção e Comercialização de Jaboticaba LTDA. Through the research the formation of three distinct groups of associates was observed, group one is represented by the largest number of associates, but with the lowest turnover in relation to the other groups, group two presents a higher transaction volume of inputs than the other groups analyzed, and group three represented by the lower number of associates, however with the highest commercial importance, and with the largest volume of billings and grain deposits. Even the cooperative studied, not always presenting the best prices of products for both the purchase of inputs and the commercialization of the grain harvest, the cooperative in the majority, has the preference to transact with it. Regarding the social participation of the members of the cooperative, most of the interviewees are assiduous, except in cases such as lectures and courses in which the participation percentage is relatively lower. This differentiation of the members into groups allows the cooperative to identify the profile of the associates and the areas of transactions that are most attractive to the different groups of members that deal with the cooperative. In its entirety, the cooperative meets the purposes and expectations of the sample of associates studied, satisfactorily fulfilling its social and economic role.