TY - JOUR

T1 - Argentine clustering of soy biodiesel production

T2 - The role of international networks and the global soy oil and meal markets

AU - Tomei, Julia

AU - Upham, Paul

PY - 2011/1/18

Y1 - 2011/1/18

N2 - Argentina aspires to become the global equivalent of Brazil for biodiesel and is well placed to do so. With a large, efficient and export-focused agricultural sector, Argentina is the world's third largest exporter of soy and sunflower oils. Growing global demand and, to a far lesser extent, domestic demand for biofuels is contributing to the expansion of soy production and processing in Argentina, much of which is centred around the Paraná River. The Argentine biofuels sector exhibits clustering at both the cultivation and processing levels, but is also strongly dependent on other relationships both nationally and internationally, including research and development linkages with international biotechnology firms and the more economically significant soy oil and meal markets. Although the trend of horizontal and vertical integration is advanced and likely to continue, we argue that clustering, in the sense of geographic proximity, needs to be seen in the context of the value chain. To date, governance of the soy industry has been characterised by declining government intervention in production, processing and export processes. In the absence of strong policy, it has been left to agroindustry to determine the development of the nascent biofuels sector, towards one focused primarily on the export market and leading to substantial gains for some actors in the value chain and losses for weaker players.

AB - Argentina aspires to become the global equivalent of Brazil for biodiesel and is well placed to do so. With a large, efficient and export-focused agricultural sector, Argentina is the world's third largest exporter of soy and sunflower oils. Growing global demand and, to a far lesser extent, domestic demand for biofuels is contributing to the expansion of soy production and processing in Argentina, much of which is centred around the Paraná River. The Argentine biofuels sector exhibits clustering at both the cultivation and processing levels, but is also strongly dependent on other relationships both nationally and internationally, including research and development linkages with international biotechnology firms and the more economically significant soy oil and meal markets. Although the trend of horizontal and vertical integration is advanced and likely to continue, we argue that clustering, in the sense of geographic proximity, needs to be seen in the context of the value chain. To date, governance of the soy industry has been characterised by declining government intervention in production, processing and export processes. In the absence of strong policy, it has been left to agroindustry to determine the development of the nascent biofuels sector, towards one focused primarily on the export market and leading to substantial gains for some actors in the value chain and losses for weaker players.

KW - Energy research

KW - Agroindustry

KW - Argentina

KW - Clustering

KW - Production networks

KW - Soy-based biodiesel

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=79951849119&partnerID=8YFLogxK

UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/03a0e2b1-909f-37f0-b685-380d3532f501/

U2 - 10.2174/1874923201104010045

DO - 10.2174/1874923201104010045

M3 - Journal articles

AN - SCOPUS:79951849119

VL - 4

SP - 45

EP - 54

JO - Open Geography Journal

JF - Open Geography Journal

SN - 1874-9232

ER -