Economic concentration in the Pampeana region: The case of the financial trustfunds

Abstract

In the last decade of the twentieth century, the trend of economic concentration of the agrarian production of the pampas region was strengthen, expressed in a mayor reduction of the sectorïs firms. Even when there is no census data to quantify it after the 2001-2002 crisis, there are several signs that imply that this process continues in the present. Big lessee capitals appear on the leading roll, managing to obtain economies of scale by taking a large tract of land, which allows them to displace their smaller rivals thanks to their capacity to propose the owners a bigger rent or better conditions to pay it. This paper offers the results of an investigation about one of the juridical forms that this process adopts: the setting up of Financial Trust Funds (FTF). The growth of this kind of financial tool since 2004 has been impressive, and it was partially used in the agrarian sector. After systematize the information of the FTFs placed in the market in the 2004-2008 period, this paper focus its attention on the ones that finance agrarian activities. It estimates the weight they have in the capitalization of the sector, analyzing the productive strategies and characteristics of those that have per purpose the sowing in leased lands, allowing us to offer concrete figures about the microeconomic base of the sector's concentration.