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Petrobras does not reach an agreement with a subsidiary and employees announce an indefinite strike starting this Thursday (20/05)
After failing to reach an agreement, workers at Petrobras Biocombustível (PBio) went on strike for an indefinite period, starting at 7am this Thursday (20/05). Such a move is a response to the intolerance of Petrobras' management, which refused to negotiate the maintenance of jobs for the subsidiary's oil workers, which is in the final process of being privatized. See also: The oil workers' strike was confirmed on May 3 at Petrobras oil platforms in the Campos Basin
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Workers' strike at PBio (Petrobras Biocombustível)
Petrobras Biocombustível workers demand transfer to other Petrobras units. However, the state-owned company uses the PBio sales model as a legal impossibility to meet the claim of the FUP - Single Federation of Petroleum Workers and affiliated unions.
Alexandre Finamori, coordinator of the Sindipetro de Minas Gerais, says that the strike at the Petrobras Biocombustível units makes a demand for the maintenance of the jobs of the workers who have been hired at the units, who have already received all the training to work in the company. Alexandre also points out that, in 2019, workers heard a false promise that they would be reallocated to other areas of the Petrobras System in case of sale of the subsidiary.
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Sindipetro Bahia, on the other hand, says that the strike movement is the last resort due to the intransigence of the former management of Petrobras. The workers, the FUP and the directors of the Sindipetros seek, with the movement, to reopen negotiations with the new board of the state-owned company so that the sending of these workers for summary dismissal by the new company is reviewed. The objective is to change the sales model so that workers remain in the Petrobras System.
PBio units that will be paralyzed
According to the Single Federation of Petroleum Workers, the Petrobras Biocombustível strike will paralyze activities at the biofuel plants in the municipalities of Candeias, in the state of Bahia, and in the city of Montes Claros, in Minas Gerais, in addition to the headquarters of the subsidiary, located in Rio of January. The Quixadá plant, in the state of Ceará, which was also put up for sale, like the other units, has been deactivated for over four years.
The privatization of PBio – Petrobras Biocombustível was announced in July last year and is in the binding phase of sale of biofuel plants. The subsidiary was founded in 2008 and is one of the largest biodiesel producers in Brazil, with over 150 workers, including operating technicians, chemists, engineers, doctors and lawyers.
The privatization of the Petrobras subsidiary
As previously mentioned, the privatization of PBio was announced in July 2020 and is in the binding phase of the sale of the plants. At the time, Petrobras informed the market that PBio is one of the largest biodiesel producers in the country, with a 5,5% market share in 2019, and that it would have a significant growth of 25% in the biodiesel blending mandate in the next three years, with a gateway and expansion in the 3rd largest biodiesel market in the world, citing that it has a strategic location, with privileged access to the Brazilian markets in the Southeast and Northeast regions.
In 2016, when the then administration of Pedro Parente announced the closure of the Quixadá plant, in the state of Ceará, the Única dos Petroleiros Federation and Sindipetro-CE/PI denounced the impacts that the measure would have on nine thousand families of small farmers in the semiarid region that supplied the unit with oilseeds.
The workers' resistance prevented the closure of the plant, however, Petrobras' management continued to dismantle the sector and put the unit into hibernation in 2017. Today, only the Montes Claros and Candeias plants remain in activity.
