Vale do Jequitinhonha, located in the northeast of the Minas Gerais State, have been receiving, since the 1960s, a set of public programs, compensation and rural development, which brought significant resources to combat poverty and increase familiar agriculture. Using census data, field research and diagnostics over the region, this article examines some of the results of these programs. It reveals that there was a combination of income streams originated from the public sector and consumption production, explaining substantial changes in the food security, welfare and the consumption pattern of rural populations.
Vale do Jequitinhonha; public programs; family farming; rural sociology
