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MaToPiBa,
capital Balsas (MA), the fastest growing region in Brazil
7 Dec 2009
by Fabiane Stefano, from Balsas
Dating from the late 19th century the writer
Euclides da Cunha, author of
Os Sertões (The
Hinterland), wrote of drought and poverty in this region of the
Northeast. The popular image is still one of a dry, barren land
populated by poor farmers. Over a century later, there is still much
poverty, but things are changing and changing fast.
In an area formed by the Cerrado
(savannah) of Maranhão, Tocantins, Piauí, and Bahia, known as
MaToPiBa, has emerged as one of the biggest powers in agribusiness
accounting for 10% of the nations soybeans crop as well as corn and
cotton.
With 2 million inhabitants, this
region of Brazil still has a modest GDP of US$ 6 billion, equivalent
to the city of Belem, PA. However, wealth creation is
accelerating. The established grain producers are mostly migrants
from Rio Grande do Sul and Paraná states of the South. Recently
joining them are a slew of foreign investors and agribusiness
companies. They made 70% of land acquisitions in the region in 2008.
A conservative estimate is that the
Matopiba economy is growing at the rate of 10% per annum. The
expansion is chaotic and noticeable in Balsas, a town of 80,000
inhabitants in southern Maranhão, when visited by EXAME
magazine. The city was founded in 1918 as a warehouse for traders
from the hinterland. In the '70s, came the first migrants from the
South to participate in projects of rural colonization. A decade
later they began planting soybeans. The first export took place only
in 1992 and was an event in the region, although the volume was so
small it did not even fill a compartment of the ship - Vale, which
sponsored the sale, had to buy soybeans in Mato Grosso to complete
the load. However, by 2000, the region began to take off.
Today, anyone who travels along
highway BR-230 in southern Maranhão, sees pockets of agricultural
production interspersed with Cerrado vegetation. "The increase in
new arrivals to Balsas is creating two or three new barrios per
year.”, says Francisco Coelho, Mayor of the city. Balsas is
chaotic and paradoxical. While many of the streets are not paved and
mobile phone service is precarious, a hypermarket and a Japanese
restaurant are icons of the arrival of modernity. While the older
neighborhoods typical post card of poverty in the Northeast, elegant
homes with gardens are appearing in other parts of the city. A
project for a new barrio with 3,400 lots known as Cidade Nova (New
Town), is about to be launched and will be the first planned
neighborhood in the city.
"There are many opportunities here –
from the lack of restaurants to professional IT personnel " says
Paul Fachin, president of
Ceagro,
grains company who is from Toledo, Parana. Fachin was a potato
farmer and had two tractors and a truck when he arrived in Balsas in
1986. Today, Ceagro has revenues of R$ 300 million per year. Last
year, he sold 40% of the company to the Argentine group
Los Grobo.
Moving companies stocked with foreign
money is great in the region. The AGRINVEST, controlled by U.S. fund
Ridgefield Capital, last year bought 20,000 ha and leased another
43,000 to produce grain to South of Balsas. "The pay here is more
attractive than in the Centro-Oeste," said Roberto Martinez,
director of the Ridgefield Capital. Calyx Agro, a company formed by
the French group Louis Dreyfus and U.S. insurer AIG, evaluates
acquire land.
"There are very good properties here.
We are constantly looking at investment opportunities," said Harald
Brunckhorst, director of Calyx, who visited Maranhão in June. Calyx
has cultivated 27,000 hectares of soybeans in western Bahia, another
area of MaToPiBa. The region caught investors eyes by bringing
together several advantages. It is one of the areas with greater
availability of land in the country - it is estimated that 3 million
hectares are available for new land, equivalent to half the area
occupied by sugar cane in Brazil.
Despite the high demand over the past
three years, which has doubled the value of land in the best
locations, the average price is still 40% less than the Cerrado of
the Centro-Oeste (Goias, Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul). Foreign
investors prefer MaToPiBa as there are less environmental
issues. Here, land-usage environmental preservation is 35%, while in
northern Mato Grosso (considered part of the Amazon) it is
80%. Logistics is another key point.
Much of the region is served by the
North-South railway, operated by Vale. Their rail lines transport
soybeans to the Maranhão port of Itaqui to be exported. Shipping
times to Europe are six days than the Paranaguá Port in Paraná,
where most soybeans in Mato Grosso are shipped. The combination of
cheaper land and lower logistics costs generates a return of up to
8% a year - double the traditional areas of savannah, according to
calculations by consulting AgraFNP.
However, the privileged geographical
position is only partially utilized. The Port of Itaqui has the
capacity to export 2 million tons - less than half of what the
region produces. The port has become a bottleneck for the growth of
MaToPiBa. Agro
Algar, Algar
group, the only soybean crushing facility in Maranhão, has plans to
increase by 35% to processing capability. "But we will only expand
when the port is able to export more," said President Luiz Gonzaga
Maciel. Five years ago the region's businesses expect to open bids
for the construction of a terminal grain exports - now the shipments
occur at intervals of load ore from Vale. On two occasions, the
bidding process began, but was suspended, frustrating the consortium
of five companies, including Bunge and Cargill, who had already
booked 100 million reais for the project. As port expansion is
unknown, the way is to try to industrialize part of agricultural
production there by yourself.
Although production in the field will
grow rapidly in Maranhao, Piaui and Tocantins, the agribusiness
sector is still in its infancy. This is one of the main differences
between this this region and western Bahia, considered the rich
cousin of MaToPiBa. The agribusinesses raise local incomes, but
have been restricted due manpower shortages as commercial
agriculture is mechanized. "Ten years from now, Balsas will be what Luiz Eduardo Magalhaes is today," says Rodrigo Santos, chief
strategy officer of Monsanto, which operates in the region selling
seeds.
"Tocantins and Maranhao are among the
fastest growing markets," said João Truran, Director of Vivo to the
Midwest and Northeast. From January to March this year, sales of
packages of Internet access grew by 138% and 119% in Tocantins
Maranhão. The shortcomings of MaToPiBa entail difficulties for the
companies located there. The SLC, which has a farm in Tasso Fragoso,
on the border with Maranhão, Piauí, Tocantins uses telephone lines -
a network that is over 100 miles away. The same goes for hiring
personnel.
"It's not easy to take people there,"
said Jose Luiz Glaser, director of Cargill. The problem of course is
also an opportunity. Two years ago, local businessman Francisco
Honaiser founded the
UniBalsas
(university), which has six majors and 600 students. Has invested 8
million dollars in the. Honaiser is a typical member of the
generation of pioneers in the region. Gaucho Carazinho, came to
Balsas to plant rice in 1976 and soon after, opened a farm equipment
dealership. "My children had to leave Balsa to study ," he says."Now,
not only those from here, but others in the region can now study
here."
The new Brazilian Sertão (hinterland)
source:
Exame - click for original article in Portuguese
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