ILPC 2026

From the perspective of creating sustainable strategies, green jobs are born, understood as forms of decent work dedicated to protect and restore continuously and efficiently the environment. However, although from appearing as a possible common response to environmental and social challenges, often the environmental aspect is superimposed on the social. Grounded on this perception, the objective of this study is to understand to what extent is the worker protection in green jobs, analyzing if this protection actually exists; how it is and if it is greater than the protection afforded to workers in traditional and non-green sectors of the economy. To answer the questions proposed, it was assumed a qualitative approach, using as research methods: a literature review; documentary research and analysis of Brazilian experience more potentially promoting green jobs, according to the International Labor Organization: the sugar cane plantation in the state of São Paulo, the largest producer of sugarcane in Brazil, intended to produce biofuel. Despite this potential, the sugarcane industry has been marked by the degrading conditions of work that subject the workers and the generation of environmental pollution to the region, given the large fires promoted in the sugarcane plantations to facilitate the manual cutting of sugarcane. This reality, however, has been (partially) modified: nowadays, more than 80% of its lands intended for sugar cane plantation are mechanized, which substantially reduced the practice of straw burning. This advance of mechanization in São Paulo was strongly encouraged by the “Protocolo Agroambiental do Setor Sucroalcooleiro Paulista” (“Agro-Environmental Paulista Sugarcane Industry Protocol”), whose purpose was the adoption of actions aimed at strengthening the sustainable development of sugarcane industry in the State of São Paulo. However, despite the scope of promoting sustainability, and despite having protective environment provisions, the Protocol was silent on the workers of this sector. Considering this context, it sought to contribute to the study of agroindustrial complex from a sociolaboral perspective, highlighting the importance of its social aspect, warning about the existence of false green jobs and reflecting on the omission and contempt of the Agroindustrial Protocol about workers' social protection, both in relation to the one who stays in manual cutting, as one who has been replaced by the machine.