What have been the Effects of Monetary and Exchange Rate Shocks on Brazilian Agriculture GDP? The Direct and Indirect Effects Approach

From 1996 to 2016, Brazil faced great fluctuations in both its exchange and interest rates and simultaneously a huge growth of its agriculture has taken place. Examining the literature that deals with the relationships among these three variables (interest rate, exchange rate and agriculture GDP) we verified that monetary and exchange shocks can affect directly and/or indirectly (through relative prices) the agriculture GDP. However, these effects can be coincident or contrary between them. What actually happened in Brazil from 1996 to 2016? This article aimed to access the direct and indirect effects of monetary and exchange rate shocks on Brazil´s agriculture GDP taking into consideration years ranging from 1996 thru 2016. Using quarterly data for the 1996-2016 period, autoregressive vector models (VAR and VEC) were estimated. The exchange rate and monetary shocks were analyzed considering three different interest rate types, namely: the current Brazil´s Federal Funds Rate (Nominal SELIC rate), real interest rate of agricultural loans, and ex-ante real interest rate. We also analyzed the effect of the exchange rate separately on prices paid and on prices received by the agriculture (both make up the relative prices of agriculture) using an ARDL (Distributed Lag Self-Regressive Model) model with monthly data. Our econometric results revealed that both direct and indirect effects of monetary shocks were negative on the agriculture growth while the direct and indirect effects of exchange rate shocks were mutually contradictory themselves on the Brazil´s agriculture GDP. Because of the technical changes that have taken place during the 2000s and the 2010s, which turned some of the most representative crops more dependent on imported inputs, and the hedging behavior that the firms have adopted during the first two decades of the 21st century, which protects them from exchange oscillations, the agricultural sector lost sensitivity to the exchange rate variations in some extent. Regarding policy implications, it could be said that monetary policy can be efficient in the promotion of the agricultural sector, and, in fact, Brazilian government has been doing such through the rural credit subsidized interest rate. Exchange policy, on the other hand, proved to be inefficient in favoring the agriculture, or, in other words, the government can freely exercise exchange policy without regards to harm the agricultural sector.