The Americas Agriculture

With demand for cacao on the rise and a projected global deficit of 1m tonnes by 2020, according to the International Cacao Organisation (ICCO), cacao production in Colombia is set to receive special attention in the next few years. While the country currently accounts for only 1% of global cacao production, the potential for much higher...

Decades of conflict, affecting primarily rural areas, have taken their toll on Colombia’s agricultural sector. High fragmentation and rural poverty have stifled large-scale investments and prevented productivity gains, while a deficient transport and infrastructure network add to domestic production costs. In recent years, increased global...

In recent years Colombia has signed a number of free trade agreements (FTA), significantly expanding its access to new markets across the globe. The most recent, with South Korea, was signed in February 2013 and has yet to come into force. The agricultural sector is particularly sensitive to new FTAs and fears of the negative impact increased...

Although it has a number of free trade agreements (FTAs), Mexico’s diversification of export markets has been slow. In 2013, five countries – the US, Japan, Canada, Venezuela and Guatemala – accounted for 84.7% of Mexico’s agrifood exports. In the past few years, diversification efforts have for the most part been directed at penetrating...

For the past decade the agriculture sector has grown marginally, as the rest of the economy continues to industrialise. The slow pace of expansion has been due to a number of structural inefficiencies which limit productivity growth, in particular the prevalence of small-scale farmers, limited financing options and widespread rural poverty. In...

While the large share of high-value services in Panama’s economy, including finance, telecommunications and logistics, is envious for emerging economies around the world, the small size of its agricultural sector arouses some concern. Despite impressive GDP growth in recent years, including regional records of over 10%, the agriculture sector...