Technological and socioeconomic characterization of Cucurbita argyrosperma Huber production systems in Champotón, Campeche, Mexico

The state of Campeche, Mexico, occupies first place in the production of Cucurbita argyrosperma Huber, with the municipality of Champotón contributing 7% of state production. Chihua squash production systems were characterized based on their technological and socioeconomic level by applying a semi-structured questionnaire to those responsible for the Chihua squash production systems. The data were analyzed using principal components, clusters, and comparison of means with the Tukey test (P≤0.05). Three groups of producers were identified: G1, G2, and G3, grouping 28, 100, and 8 people, respectively. G1 has intermediate land availability, intermediate salaried labor, producer organizations, seed processing, average purchase-sale contract, medium use of technologies, higher income per unit of area, and represents 20.58% of producers; G2 has lower land availability, lower number of salaried labor, low organization of producers, seed processing, no purchase-sale agreement, low use of technologies, lower income per unit of area and utility, and concentrates 73.53% of producers; G3 has greater availability of land, greater number of salaried labor and producer organizations, does not process seeds, has greater purchase-sale agreement, high use of technologies, average income values, and represents 5.88% of the producers. The group with the highest technological index was not the one with the highest profitability, which was determined by producer organizations and the availability of land.