Determinantes dos arranjos contratuais1: O caso da transação produtor-processador de carne bovina no Uruguai

What are the determinants of the commercial channel choice in the beef producers-processors transactions? The question refers to the coordination and production control problem associated to changes in consumer’s awareness of specific attributes in food products. Two contractual arrangements coexist in this transaction: direct-contracting and broker-induced transactions Transaction Cost Economic offers helpful insights to understand the reason for the development and adaptations of different contractual arrangement moved by transaction cost economizing perspective. The empirical analysis is focused in the Uruguayan beef agro-industrial system. Analysis integrates (i) institutional and organizational changes in the beef industry; (ii) based on the analysis of the transaction dimensions (frequency, asset specificity and uncertainty) we address hypothesis of the determinants of the contractual arrangement in the beef producers-processors transaction; and (iii) we run a statistical test of the hypotheses based on a logit model. We used a panel data with producers-processors transaction from Uruguayan Agricultural Bureau (77,000 transactions). We confirm the hypotheses of the determinants of the contractual arrangement choice. The probability of a transaction being aligned with the direct contractual arrangement increase in transaction with higher asset specificity (i.e., young steer), lower distance between the producer and the processor, and with higher frequency of transaction.

肉牛养殖户与加工商交易中的商业渠道选择决定因素为何？该问题关联于消费者对食品特定属性认知变化所引发的协调与生产控制难题。此类交易中并存两类契约安排：直接契约交易与经纪人介导交易。交易成本经济学（Transaction Cost Economics, TCE）为理解基于交易成本节约视角下各类契约安排的演进与调整动因提供了极具价值的理论洞见。本实证分析聚焦于乌拉圭肉牛农工产业体系。本次研究的分析框架涵盖三部分：其一，肉牛产业的制度与组织变革；其二，基于交易维度（交易频率、资产专用性与不确定性）的分析，探究肉牛养殖户与加工商交易中契约安排的决定因素假说；其三，基于Logit模型对前述假说开展统计检验。研究使用乌拉圭农业局提供的养殖户-加工商交易面板数据集，共计77000笔交易样本。研究证实了契约安排选择决定因素的相关假说。当交易具备更高的资产专用性（如幼肉牛交易）、养殖户与加工商间的地理距离更短，且交易频率更高时，该交易采用直接契约安排的概率显著提升。