In this paper the long-term interrelationships between types of colonization, the resulting agricultural structures, and the types of connection between local farms and international manufacturers are studied in the tobacco industries of Brazil and Zimbabwe. The argumentation is devoloped in three steps: It starts with a conception of colonialism as the origin of pathdependent processes which mold agricultural structures and limit the choices of supply strategies on the part of the manufacturing industry. In the second section the auction system in Zimbabwe and the system of contract farming in southern Brazil are analyzed as variants of "market" and "hierarchy", which couple agriculture with industry. The observed intersectoral linking structures are then explained in terms of transaction-cost and resource dependence theory.