Antonio Zotarelli

This work aims to analyze the process of loss of the dynamism suffered by the soybean agroindustrial complex in Paraná when compared with the Center-West area of the country. After being introduced a technological paradigm for the modernization of the Brazilian agriculture in the seventies, it appeared in the following decade, a new productive area which used innovative process which incorporated the results of agricultural research and it started to attract the interest of agroindustrial complex. That power of inter-regional competition led the academic literature to discuss the process of "displacement" of the south area agroindustry to the Center-West area. The reason behind it was that a more modern industry  was being settled in the Center-west while in Paraná they continued using the old technological model. As a consequence, this State lost its competitiveness in the soybean agroindustrial complex as well as a great part of its developing dynamism. In that sense, this research has as objectives analyzing the competitiveness of the paranaense soybean in relation to the Center-West one, observing the behavior in economic and technological terms of some variebles as the production, the area and the productivity in the soybean crop of Paraná in comparision with Center-West region. It also tries to analyze the competitiveness in the crushing industry and in the logistic aspects of the activity. The theoretical fundamental is based in the schumpeterian theory, its neo-schumpeterians unfoldings and concepts of competitiveness. A bibliographical revision on the main approaching focuses was carried out. Secondary data subsidized the process analysis. The  data series (1980/99) referring to the area and production of the period were divided and analyzed in two sub-periods: eighties and nineties. The two analyzed periods showed different behaviors. Results indicated some reversion of the tendencies pointed by the literature because, in the nineties, Paraná retook its competitive capacity in the productive aspects as well as in the other analyzed economic and technological variables. They also make us reflect upon the dynamism and the inter-regional competition in the soybean agroindustrial complex in Brazil.