ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses changes in some of the main Brazilian agri-chains, investigating how they were able to react positively to changes in the institutional and competitive contexts in both domestic and international markets. It focuses on the ways in which the transactions linking farmers, input suppliers and processors are coordinated. The chapter shows how the players of Brazilian agri-chains reorganized their markets and created new tools to access credit, technological innovations and, most decisively, the international market. Private and governmental actors were able to change their relations according to changes in the institutional and competitive environments from the 1980s onward. Various arrangements were created to accommodate regional and socioeconomic differences, in which small family farms and large-scale farms were incorporated into the new setting, according to their competitive advantages.
