ABSTRACT
The urban centers, especially the industrial ones, exhibited higher mortality rates than the rural areas, particularly in the lower age groups. Despite the large numbers involved in agricultural work and their unfavorable insertion in the process of change, there exists virtually no information concerning the general working conditions of this group nor basic morbidity and mortality data. Work determines the forms of consumption by different roads that are related to the historical forms of production. For example, in peasant subsistence agriculture consumption is linked to production, since what is produced is directly consumed. The role of agriculture in the process of capital accumulation is related to the industrial sector, and as a pool of accumulation in itself. Information concerning the mortality of agricultural workers in the underdeveloped countries is extremely scarce; therefore, it will be necessary to rely on data that are not, strictly speaking, related to this group but do have some indicative value.
