ABSTRACT
This paper analyses Bolivia’s industrial value-chain agriculture and argues that a new phase of control grabbing is occurring via value-chain relations. New forms of capital from emerging economies are penetrating Bolivia’s countryside and drastically changing the forms and relations of production, property, and power. These processes are analysed by disaggregating the agro-industrial value chain and revealing where the value being produced is appropriated and how the terms of control are changing. The widespread use of genetically modified soybeans and industry’s appropriation of natural inputs have opened new spaces for capital to penetrate, circulate, and accumulate, particularly from Brazil, Argentina, and China. As the production process becomes increasingly commodified, smallholders are adversely incorporated into value-chain relations, threatening their ability to work their land now and in the future.
