Constructing parallels: Brazilian expertise and the commodification of land, labour and money in Mozambique

Abstract

As part of a larger push for so-called South–South development, Brazil is supporting projects in a growing number of countries across Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa. In this paper, we investigate the agricultural project ProSAVANA in Mozambique. We draw on research conducted in Brazil and Mozambique and argue that the attempt to replicate Brazil's successes in agro-industrial commodity production discounts the importance of nationally specific relationships between the state, land, labour and capital.

Résumé

Dans le cadre de ce qu’il est convenu de nommer le développement Sud-Sud, le Brésil soutient des projets dans un nombre croissant de pays en Amérique latine et en Afrique subsaharienne. Nous présentons les résultats d’une recherche menée au Brésil et au Mozambique sur le projet agricole ProSAVANA. Cette tentative de reproduire au Mozambique les succès du Brésil dans la production agro-industrielle néglige l’importance des relations entre l’état, la main d’œuvre et le capital qui sont particulières à chaque pays.

Keywords:

• land grabs
• South–South development
• agricultural science
• Brazil
• Mozambique

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the scientists, politicians and activists in Brazil and Mozambique who agreed to be interviewed for this piece. The article received very helpful comments from colleagues in the Land Team at Cornell, as well as from two anonymous reviewers for this journal. All mistakes are our own.

Notes

1. Brazilian investors and agro-industrial capitalists are also involved in acquiring land and productive capacity in Latin America, a trend referred to as “foreignisation” or land grabbing in the region (Borras, Kay, and Wilkinson 2012; Urioste 2012). Because Brazil's involvement in Latin America is distinct from its efforts in Africa, we focus only on the latter in this article.

2. The research is carried on today by a non-profit company, Fundação Bahia (Bahia Foundation), supported by seed companies, and input and agricultural chemical firms.

3. For a full copy of the press release, see http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2002/08/12_food.html

4. “Discurso do Presidente da República, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, durante cerimônia descerramento de placa alusiva à visita às instalaçães do escritório regional da Embrapa na África – Acra, Gana, 20/04/2008,” Boletim Mundorama, April 20, 2008.

5. Thanks to Sara Pritchard for pointing out that what appeared to be a South–South collaboration was really North–South in many ways.

6. The Nacala Fund brochure can be seen found at: http://www.oecd.org/forum/issues/NACALA%20CORRIDOR%20FUND-FGV%20Projetos.pdf

7. See also “Embrapa in 2030”, which was listed on Folha's website as of January 28, 2015: http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/fsp/opiniao/41196-a-embrapa-em-2030.shtml

Additional information

Funding

The authors would like to thank both the National Science Foundation (Directorate for Social, Behavioural and Economic Sciences/Division of Social and Economic Sciences, Award No. 1331265) and the Institute for the Social Sciences at Cornell University for funding the research in this article.

Biographical notes

Wendy Wolford is Polson Professor of Development Sociology at Cornell University. Her research interests include social movements, land distribution, agricultural knowledge, development and the politics of land management. She has published widely, with two books on the struggle for land in Brazil: To Inherit the Earth (with Angus Wright, Food First Books, 2003) and This Land is Ours Now (Duke University Press, 2010). She is a founding member of the Land Deal Politics Initiative.

Ryan Nehring is a PhD student in the Department of Development Sociology at Cornell University. His research focuses on the role of scientific expertise in the agricultural transformation of Brazil's Cerrado region and the relations of scientific knowledge production within and between national agricultural research systems. His articles have appeared or are forthcoming in the Journal of Peasant Studies and the Canadian Journal of Development Sociology.