World Food Policy Volume 2, Number 1, Spring 2015 | Page 35
World Food Policy
12
10
8
11.28
7.76
6
4
2
0
1.80
1.72
3.52
Sector's
share
in
Share
of
national
Share
of
national
Share
of
national
Sector's
expanded
national
value
value
added
value
added
value
added
share
in
national
added
through
forward
through
backward
through
all
value
added
links
links
linkages
Note: The first column shows the share of the sum of the sectors’ values added as measured by national
accounts. The second and third columns show the components “forward” and “backward,” respectively.
The fourth column presents the sum of the previous two links. And the fifth column shows the end result—
the sum of the first and fourth columns: the expanded VA. Source: Authors’ calculations using the
methodology of linkages presented in the text, based on the latest available Chilean national accounts.
Figure 1. VA of the Expanded Food and Forestry Product Sector as a Percent of Total
National VA, 2008
assessment of the contribution of a sector
to employment, poverty reduction, rural–
urban migration contribution to culture,
the environment (positive and negative)
economic viability of traditional peoples,
and contribution to the landscape.
Previous, similar exercises (de
Ferranti, et al. 2005) have looked at the
integration of agriculture with the rest of
the economy in Mexico, Colombia, and
Chile, and show that this integration is
correlated with the level of development.
As one would expect, with a more
refined division of labor and economic
specialization—enhanced
by
trade
openness—agriculture’s share in national
GDP declines with the growth of linkages
with the rest of the economy. A better
appreciation of the evolving structure
of the agro-food sector—and of the
importance of agricultural policy beyond
the farm gate—could be heightened by
moving beyond a superficial emphasis of
many economists and policymakers on
the primary sector in national accounts.
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