farms, we explored available statistical information from the
Brazilian Agricultural Census of 2006 conducted by the Brazilian
Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE). This census
is based on interviews carried out virtually in the totality of
rural households in Brazil and coherently considers family
farms in accordance to national law defining (Law n 11.326,
July 24, 2006). We used data for households already aggregated
by IBGE according the abovementioned law, except for some
indicators not available by IBGE for which we relied on data
prepared according to the definition of family farming adopted
by FAO and INCRA, as indicated in