COOPERATIVISM IN THE WEST OF PAULISTA AND THE GERMAN INFLUENCE: THE COOPERATIVA RIOGRANDENSE AND THE REGIONAL TRANSFORMATIONS

Abstract

The expansion of railroads in the State of São Paulo allowed the development of cities along its route. As it is a region of recent settlement, Alta Sorocabana de Assis has, since its foundation, largely depended on agriculture and logging services for the maintenance of the Sorocabana Railroad. After the founding of the city of Assis in 1905, new towns emerged and later achieved their political-administrative emancipation, giving rise to smaller municipalities. The presence of small landowners in the study region made agriculture their main source of livelihood. The article seeks to explain the movement around cooperative work and the initiative of the first settlers in facing a new natural environment. In 1939, the first works began that would later form the basis for the future Cooperativa Mista da Colônia Riograndense, idealized by Michel Lamb, who had just arrived from Rio Grande do Sul in 1922. The cooperative work was important for the first German immigrants to be able to start the transformation of the forest exercising a culture focused on its subsistence. In the 1970s, there was a shift towards crops of high commercial value, with a direct impact on the growth and consolidation of the Cooperative.