Concentration and Dynamics of the Brazilian Agriculture

Background

The fact that the agricultural area of a country changes over time has long been a subject of study in Latin America. In many cases, the studies have explored the concept of agricultural frontier (Comisión Económica para América Latina, 1983). This approach has been particularly relevant in the case of the Brazilian agriculture (Mueller, 1983; Sawyer, 1983; Homem de Melo, 1983; Mueller & Martha Júnior, 2008). In this type of studies, there is a special interest in the description of changes in policies that resulted in the expansion of the agricultural area (internal migrations, credit programs, roads opening, irrigation projects, etc.). Nevertheless, Sawyer (1983) mentions that, for some products, the expansion to new areas may take place at the same time as a retraction from traditional areas. Therefore, even if characterized on largely qualitative terms, the idea that agriculture may move from some places to others, at least with reference to a single product, was already present in these studies. In general, the emphasis was placed on the historical, sociological and political aspects which caused the changes in the agricultural frontier. In any case, there was no systematic effort to provide some form of measurement of the extent of the observed changes.