DETERMINANTS OF BRAZILIAN AGRICULTURAL EXPORTS AND ITS RELATIONSHIP WITH FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT

Abstract

The present study aims to evaluate the relationship of interdependence between the Brazilian agricultural exports, foreign direct investment in the agricultural export sector, world income and the exchange rate, and to identify which of these variables has really influenced the performance ofBrazil's agricultural exports. For this, we estimated a standard VAR model, from which was conducted the Granger Causality Test and the variance decomposition of forecast error. The analysis shows that the foreign income is an important part of the variance of the Brazilian agricultural exports, FDI in the sector has not obtained a relevant participation and that the exchange rate variable, through their effects on foreign income, had an indirect influence on agricultural exports. These results converge on the importance of direct foreign capital inflow, in the agricultural sector, be directed to create infrastructure and new production units, not allowing that the entry of foreign investment in this sector continues to be characterized as a process of internationalization of production of certain agroindustrial chains.