Assessment of sustentability on agriculture using multicriteria methods/Aplicacao de metodos multicriterio ordinais em dados de producao agricola, para avaliacao da sustentabilidade/Aplicación de métodos ordinales multicriterio en datos de producción agrícola para evaluación de la sostenibilidad

This paper aims at the application of multicriteria methods to sort familiar producers with agroecological criteria for a sustainability assessment. Data regarding production available for sale at weekly fairs, distributed over the months from January to December 2009, were collected. This study was conducted in the town of Miguel Couto, municipality of Nova Iguacu, Rio de Janeiro state, Brasil. Items or products offered for sale were listed in quantities and average value in Reais. Data from the monthly fairs were consolidated by lot and by product. Seventeen lots of family farmers were analyzed, with a total of 48 different items produced under three different criteria: number of months of lots production in the year, representing the seasonality of production; average value of production of the consignment in Reais, representing the estimated revenues; and variety of items produced by lot, representing diversity. Lots 6 and 26 stood out as top finishers in the rankings, by the ordinal methods used, presenting the larger varieties of produced items. Already lot 14, second highest estimated revenue of the group, had its place in the ranking alternating between fourth and fifth place, by the methods of Condorcet and Borda, respectively, probably due to its smaller variety of items produced. The methods used in this work have shown promise as tools to assist in decision making, the definition of strategies and management of agro-ecological family farming.