Looking into the future
The Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply (Mapa) sees with caution the question of corn supply in the Country.
Minister Blairo Maggi understands that the strong demand for corn both at home and abroad has pushed up the prices of the ce-
real and diminished its offer, which requires caution when it comes to managing the public stocks of the cereal. He also has it that
the government is already in search of alternatives for 2017, like the withdrawal of the contribution for the Program of Social Inte-
gration and for the Social Security Financing Contribution (PIS/Cofins) for imports.
“If we allow corn to enter the Country at lower prices, we signal that farmers could sell their corn at higher prices in the future”,
he explains. With the increase of the minimum price of the cereal, the idea is also to stimulate the farmers to seed more corn. Fur-
thermore, Maggi says that the ministry is always in contact with the industries, especially the integrated or integrating ones, encour-
aging them to store their own stocks, just like what used to happen in the past. “The market has changed and Brazil is now insert-
ed into the global corn scenario”, he concludes.
55
The Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply
(Mapa) announced the rules of the 2016/2017 Agricultur-
al and Livestock Plan, in early July 2016. In Minister Blairo
Maggi’s term of office, in the new growing season, the gov-
ernment has decided to channel to Brazilian farmers the
amount of R$ 185 billion for financing their production, in-
vestment and commercialization costs. The volume of rural
credit shrank compared to the figures announced in May,
in the amount of R$ 202.88 billion – reflecting the resizing
of the Agricultural Credit Bill (ACB), which will amount to
R$ 10 billion, at a controlled interest rate of 12.75% a year.
The commercialization and production cost oper-
ations, with controlled interest rates, will be granted R$
115.6 billion. The interest rates range from9.5% to 12.75%
a year. For farmers that fit into the National Program for
Medium-Sized Rural Producers (Pronamp), the interest
rates remain at 8.5%. For investment programs, the feder-
al government has destined R$ 34.045 billion. Mapa’s Ag-
ricultural Policy secretary, Neri Geller, is optimistic about
the perspectives of the growing season, especially because
of the projection for a total production of more than 200
million tons of grains and the high international prices.
“The forecast is for remunerative prices, and the promised
resources are significant”, he notes.
Among the innovations of the new growing season,
the National Monetary Council (NMC) has defined the ex-
clusive limit of R$ 3 million per beneficiary per agricultur-
al year. For commercialization, the defined limit is R$ 4.5
million per farmer, whilst for investments the upper lim-
it remains unaltered at R$ 430 thousand per beneficiary.
Another novelty is that large-scale farmers can count on re-
sources complementary to the upper limits of rural credit,
known as extra-ceiling, to meet their production costs. The
interest rate on resources coming from ACBs is 12.75% a
year, with an amount estimated at R$ 10 million.
The NMC has equally approved, in the 2016/2017 Ag-
ricultural and Livestock Plan, the minimum prices for the
summer crops, extractvistic and national products. Pri-
or to this approval, Mapa’s Agricultural Policy Secretari-
at had announced the minimum price for corn in Mato
Grosso and Rondônia, where a 60 kg sack soared from
R$ 13.65 to R$ 16.50. The 20.9% readjustment is to stim-
ulate the production of corn in these states, where pric-
es lag behind normal prices in other regions where the
cereal is produced, a fact that has induced many farmers
to switch to soybean. The new growing season in Brazil,
which started on July 1, extends through June 30, 2017.
Specifically for corn, in 2015, the farmers had access
to R$ 8.144 million, of which, R$ 1.6 was through the
National Program for Strengthening Family Agriculture
(Pronaf ), R$ 1.5 million came from the Pronamp and
more than R$ 4.9 million linked to no specific organ. The
biggest corn producing regions were also the ones that
absorbed the largest credit grants – South, Center-West
and Southeast, with more than R$ 7 million for the corn
fields. This figure is provided by Brazil’s Central Bank
(Bacen), published by the National Food Supply Agency
(Conab), in the June 2016 crop survey. In that year, from
January to April, the crop in question relied on resources
amounting to R$ 2.043 million.
Let us go again
2016/2017 Agricultural and Livestock Plan channels R$ 185 billion
to finance farmers’ production, investment and commercialization costs
