Caroline Todeschini

The present work sought to identify the agricultural institutions of the southern region of Brazil and its implications on the productivity of the sector, based on data from the 2006 Agricultural Census. It is a qualitative and quantitative work whose methodological procedures include the elaboration of an indicator of productivity through fuzzy logic and its study through the analysis of conglomerates and multiple linear regression. After the theoretical revision, it was noted that institutions can be defined as formal or informal rules, organizations or the market itself, and that they have path dependence and can affect the technological trajectory of an economy. Considering institutions as organizations, it was noticed that the Brazilian agricultural institutions played a fundamental role in the performance of the sector since the imperial period. Regarding the institutions of the sector in the southern region of Brazil, differences were observed among the states in terms of their number, nomenclature, type of legal entity, to which activities their actions return and the number of producers involved. Using variables of technical assistance, associativism, qualification and educational institutions as proxies, the clusters analysis made from the agricultural productivity indicator showed that most of the municipalities of the region present low performance in this area and the regression analysis indicated a positive determination between institutions and productivity in almost all analyzed cases. The largest contribution in this regard was the technical assistance variable. The results corroborate the institutionalists' arguments that institutions matter in the process of economic development insofar as they affect the technological trajectory.