Date/Time: Monday 26th November 4:00-5:00pm

Venue: Agriculture Building, 3.05

This research seminar is co-convened by the School of Natural and Environmental Sciences. It is free and open for everyone to attend.

Abstract:

Despite the weakness of macroeconomic conditions in Brazil, the agribusiness sector is still expanding and currently accounts for a relevant share of trade balance and GDP. The agribusiness responds for roughly 21% of Brazilian GDP (Cepea, 2018), although the agricultural and livestock primary sectors account for only 5-6%. In trade, the agribusiness sector has been accounting for more than 40% of exports in the last years. Brazil is a global trader of sugar, soybean, beef, poultry, orange juice and others, besides being a major exporter of ore, paper and cellullosis. China has become the most importante trade partner in the last decade, leaving behind the traditional partners the European Union, the United States and Mercosur.
However the agribusiness sector faces several challenges. Some of them are domestic and shared by several other economic sectors in Brazil. Although Brazilian producers are succesful in reducing production costs and increasing productivity, the logistic costs are very high due to the bottlenecks in the transport and storage systems. In the last years, several multinationals have invested in Brazil, but the current macroeconomic situation have limited this process.
Besides the domestic challenges, there are also those which relate to the international Market requirements. Soybean, sugar, animal protein, fruits are increasingly facing stricter technical and food safety requirements, which very often differ among importing countries and companies. Moreover, there is a trend of private companies, such as big retailers operating all over the world, impose labor and environmental standards that must be certified in order to take part of their trade networking.
Another aspect that should be focused by the Brazilian government, in order to provide more institutional support for the exporting companies, is to push forward the negotiations of bilateral trade agreements, as well as the regional initiatives under discussion, such as the EU-Mercosur biregional agreement. For many years, Brazilian diplomacy priorezed the multilateral negotiation at the World Trade Organization (WTO). However, the advances in that fórum have been very slow and several other global players have changed their strategies to the bilateral and regional initiatives.
Brazil presentes a profile of global trader. Besides the traditional European and Western Hemisphere markets, Brazil has kept trade with many countries in Asia, Africa and Middle East. Of course, these markets offer additional challenges to exporters, particularly in terms of cultural differences to deal with. The Brexit may also bring new opportunities to Brazil in terms of trade negotiation with the United Kingdom. The UK and Brazil have a long history of cooperation, since the XIX century, then Brazil became a free country. In 2017, the UK got the 14th position as destination for the Brazilian exports and the 15th in the ranking of import´s supply. However, the share in the bilateral trade is still low compared to other trade partners. On the other hand, there is expectation that the Brexit might help to strenghen the historical relations between Brazil and the UK, improving trade flows and investments.

Bio:

Dr. Sílvia Miranda is a Professor of Microeconomics and Public Policy and Planning in the College of Agriculture Luiz de Queiroz (ESALQ), University of São Paulo (USP), in Brazil. She is vice-coordinator of the Center of Advanced Research on Applied Economics – Cepea (www.cepea.esalq.usp.br ), where she develops studies about agribusiness, trade topics, mainly about non-tariff measures, agricultural and environmental policies and evaluation of food safety and sanitary public policies.
She graduated in Agronomic Engineering and received her Master and PhD in Applied Economics from the University of São Paulo, and she did her post doctoral program in the Pennsylvania State University (PSU).
Dr. Miranda has also been the head of the Department of Economics in the Union of São Paulo State Farmers (Faesp) – 1998-2001. At ESALQ, she is also vice-president of the Comission of the Bachelor´s Degree and of the Comission of International Relations.
Currently she is also an invited Professor in the Master Program EURAMA, in the École d´Ingénieurs de Purpan, in France. She takes part of the IATRC – International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium.
She has published most of her production in Brazilian economic journals, and more recently some papers in international journals, as well as book chapters in English (CABI and the World Bank). She has worked as a consultant for the International Development Bank (IDB), for the Interamerican Institute of Agriculture Cooperation (IICA) and for the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply (MAPA), analyzing impacts of sanitary and phytosanitary policies.