paraguay
AGRICULTURE
COOPERATION
BETWEEN PARAGUAY
AND INDIA
BY LÍA RODRÍGUEZ DE LA VEGA 1 , MATÍAS IGLESIAS 2
A
griculture is one of the most traditional and important
economic and social activities in Paraguay. In this
context, great transformations have taken place in
this domain during the last forty years: the agricultural frontier
has been extended, new crops have been introduced, with
new technology and management practices, incorporating
agricultural machinery, etc. Such changes are related to the
economic development of the country, in the circumstance
of structural changes in the productive and social matrix of
the country.
Technifi ed agriculture (based on the knowledge and use
of modern technologies) is the most expanded and covers the
largest area of the country, being one of its characteristics,
the pursuit of profitability generation with sustainable
management of resources, optimizing all elements for
obtaining greater quantities of the product. Although there
are some companies that are dedicated to the crops of this
category, their actors are in general farmers’ sole proprietors
of the land, who work with relatives.
This agriculture sector is characterized by 1) sustainable
management of soils, 2) genetic improvement of crops, 3)
rotation of crops, 4) agricultural defensives (to cope with the
attack of weeds, insects, etc.), 5) agricultural machinery, for
effi cient farming management, 6) participation of the fi nancial
system (with banks and fi nancial institutions providing credit
services for this sector), 7) use of silos (storage of production),
transport and marketing, 8) industrialization, 9) globalization
(several countries produce the main productive items, with the
main purchasing countries establishing strategies to reduce
risks and maximize revenues on a global scale), 10) technology
(scientific research in both biotechnology, and growing
sophistication of agricultural machinery), 11) applied to any
crop and in Paraguay, the main technifi ed crops are soy, wheat,
rice and corn, 12) value chain structure or productive chain (it
is not restricted to crops, but these products form a value chain
composed of diff erent links, which cover diff erent sectors.
Among the main crops of technifi ed agriculture in the
country, the cultivation of soy is the most important in terms
of extension, logistics, value of production and in economic
terms. The evolution of its crop shows sustained growth, fed
28 • PARAGUAY 2019
by favourable conditions such as the availability of land,
knowledge and research on good management practices,
etc. Its production is oriented to the satisfaction of internal
demand for processing and that of the external market, so that
the productive system as a whole receives important volumes
of money, which mobilizes the entire national economy.
The increase of production and export of soybean and its
derivatives, generated the development of the logistic system
that combines road and river transport.
As for the corn grown under this system, it has the main
characteristic of being of inter-harvest, that is, it is not sown in
summer, but after the soybean harvest, ensuring crop coverage
and rotation. Paraguay has capacities and technologies for
productive intensifi cation, but this process can only occur
when international prices are more attractive to farmers.
Wheat, which is a winter crop and therefore subject to the
rigor of the same and in the Paraguayan case, frost and out of
season rains represent the main threats. There is still much
to be done in the marketing of wheat through a more intense
process of segregation, which makes it possible to distinguish
varieties and obtain better prices, being necessary to develop
a marketing and logistics chain, in the style of the one that
already has soybean trade.
Other crops of technifi ed agriculture are sunfl ower and
canola, which although are in high demand in the world
market, remain secondary crops in the country, while the
profi tability of the productive system is concentrated in
soybean, corn and wheat crops.
The context of family farming has undergone several
transformations. Although the new rurality breaks with the
close relationship between the rural space and agricultural
production space, to become a territory that combines
agricultural production, industrial, craft, residential and
leisure activities, agriculture is still one of the most important
activities in Paraguay.
According to what has been commented, it can be pointed
out that in terms of cooperation between Paraguay and India,
some possible lines to consider are: a) the negative eff ects
of climate variability, especially in relation to irrigation
(the Indian experience of digital information provision on