Family Farming and Rural Settlements in Brazil: Overcoming Challenges in Promoting Sustainable Rural Development

Abstract

Family farming, supported by rural settlements over recent decades, has emerged as a social group showing great promise concerning ecological, social, and economic sustainability, as well as in producing larger quantities and higher quality of food. Thus, the objective is to highlight the importance of family farming and rural settlements in this context. To this end, a bibliographic review was conducted to foster discussion and interlink concepts of family farming, rural settlements, multifunctionality, and sustainable rural development. A comparison was made between research conducted in 2016 and 2022 to evaluate changes concerning environmental issues in the studied rural settlement. It was observed that the settlers maintained their previously established multifunctional roles, especially regarding environmental aspects.