IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/agrhuv/v41y2024i2d10.1007_s10460-023-10514-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

From rent-seeking to rent-producing: explaining Cargill’s strategy to control value chains by proliferating links within them

Author

Listed:
  • Anthony Pahnke

    (San Francisco State University)

Abstract

Agribusiness corporations primarily involved in providing livestock feed—colloquially known as the “ABCD” (Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Bunge, Cargill, and the Louis Dreyfus Company)—have begun to enter the fishing industry around the world. I argue that this recent entry of agribusiness multinationals in aquaculture, focusing particularly on Cargill, arises to take advantage of strategic opportunities to proliferate, or create links with respect to feed production and development within value chains. Concerning such opportunities, as I document, Cargill first leveraged its access to cheap, overproduced grains in the 1990s, developing ways to insert corn and soy into what it calls “aquafeed.” Next, the multinational firm began proliferating links within fishing industry value chains in the form of introducing new technical assistance services, as well as creating feed supplements and additives. As I explain, these efforts to proliferate links in the supply chain exist as opportunities to charge rents, or surplus profits, which is possible because Cargill retains the right to control the new products and services. An additional link in the chain includes how the corporation has expanded its role in the global food system from its past as an intermediary, to engaging consumers in direct ways by attempting to create their preferences. I conduct my analysis of Cargill’s corporate strategy by focusing on reporting from the fishing industry publication, Aquafeed News, detailing developments from 2000 through 2023.

Suggested Citation

  • Anthony Pahnke, 2024. "From rent-seeking to rent-producing: explaining Cargill’s strategy to control value chains by proliferating links within them," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 41(2), pages 769-783, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:41:y:2024:i:2:d:10.1007_s10460-023-10514-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s10460-023-10514-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10460-023-10514-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10460-023-10514-7?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Trujillo-Barrera, Andres & Mallory, Mindy L. & Garcia, Philip, 2012. "Volatility Spillovers in U.S. Crude Oil, Ethanol, and Corn Futures Markets," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 37(2), pages 1-16, August.
    2. Trejo-Pech, Carlos Omar & House, Lisa & Lopez-Reyna, Carmen, 2003. "Cargill Hybrid Seeds Mexico: A Case Study," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 5(3), pages 1-23.
    3. Tania Salerno, 2017. "Cargill’s corporate growth in times of crises: how agro-commodity traders are increasing profits in the midst of volatility," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 34(1), pages 211-222, March.
    4. Philip Mcmichael, 2013. "Value-chain Agriculture and Debt Relations: contradictory outcomes," Third World Quarterly, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(4), pages 671-690.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ríos Núnez, Sandra & Benítez Jiménez, Diócles & Soria Re, Sandra, 2015. "Cadenas agroalimentarias territoriales. Tensiones y aprendizajes desde el sector lácteo de la Amazonía ecuatoriana," Revista Lecturas de Economía, Universidad de Antioquia, CIE, issue 84, pages 179-208, November.
    2. Alessandro Paolo Rigamonti & Giulio Greco & Mariarita Pierotti & Alessandro Capocchi, 2024. "Macroeconomic uncertainty and earnings management: evidence from commodity firms," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 62(4), pages 1615-1649, May.
    3. Chia-Lin Chang & Yiying Li & Michael McAleer, 2018. "Volatility Spillovers between Energy and Agricultural Markets: A Critical Appraisal of Theory and Practice," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(6), pages 1-19, June.
    4. Natanelov, Valeri & McKenzie, Andrew M. & Van Huylenbroeck, Guido, 2013. "Crude oil–corn–ethanol – nexus: A contextual approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 504-513.
    5. Vo, Duc Hong & Tran, Minh Phuoc-Bao, 2024. "Volatility spillovers between energy and agriculture markets during the ongoing food & energy crisis: Does uncertainty from the Russo-Ukrainian conflict matter?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 208(C).
    6. Al-Maadid, Alanoud & Caporale, Guglielmo Maria & Spagnolo, Fabio & Spagnolo, Nicola, 2017. "Spillovers between food and energy prices and structural breaks," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 1-18.
    7. Mac Clay, Pablo & Feeney, Roberto & Sellare, Jorge, 2024. "Technology-driven transformations in agri-food global value chains: The role of incumbent firms from a corporate venture capital perspective," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    8. Fernandez-Diaz, Jose M. & Morley, Bruce, 2019. "Interdependence among agricultural commodity markets, macroeconomic factors, crude oil and commodity index," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 174-194.
    9. Bonato, Matteo, 2019. "Realized correlations, betas and volatility spillover in the agricultural commodity market: What has changed?," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 184-202.
    10. Helena Shilomboleni, 2020. "Political economy challenges for climate smart agriculture in Africa," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 37(4), pages 1195-1206, December.
    11. Zhu, Bo & Lin, Renda & Deng, Yuanyue & Chen, Pingshe & Chevallier, Julien, 2021. "Intersectoral systemic risk spillovers between energy and agriculture under the financial and COVID-19 crises," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 105(C).
    12. Rafael Baptista Palazzi & Ata Assaf & Marcelo Cabus Klotzle, 2024. "Dynamic connectedness between energy markets and the Brazilian cash market: An empirical analysis pre‐ and post‐COVID‐19," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 44(1), pages 27-56, January.
    13. Freedom Mazwi & Abel Chemura & George T. Mudimu & Walter Chambati, 2019. "Political Economy of Command Agriculture in Zimbabwe: A State-led Contract Farming Model," Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy, Centre for Agrarian Research and Education for South, vol. 8(1-2), pages 232-257, April.
    14. Philip McMichael, 2021. "Shock and Awe in the UNFSS," Development, Palgrave Macmillan;Society for International Deveopment, vol. 64(3), pages 162-171, December.
    15. Algirdas Justinas Staugaitis & Bernardas Vaznonis, 2022. "Short-Term Speculation Effects on Agricultural Commodity Returns and Volatility in the European Market Prior to and during the Pandemic," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-26, April.
    16. Caporin, Massimiliano & Naeem, Muhammad Abubakr & Arif, Muhammad & Hasan, Mudassar & Vo, Xuan Vinh & Hussain Shahzad, Syed Jawad, 2021. "Asymmetric and time-frequency spillovers among commodities using high-frequency data," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    17. Zhou, Xinquan & Bagnarosa, Guillaume & Gohin, Alexandre & Pennings, Joost M.E. & Debie, Philippe, 2023. "Microstructure and high-frequency price discovery in the soybean complex," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 30(C).
    18. Etienne, Xiaoli L. & Irwin, Scott H. & Garcia, Philip, 2013. "Dissecting Corn Price Movements with Directed Acyclic Graphs," 2013 Annual Meeting, August 4-6, 2013, Washington, D.C. 151279, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    19. Magkonis, Georgios & Tsouknidis, Dimitris A., 2017. "Dynamic spillover effects across petroleum spot and futures volatilities, trading volume and open interest," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 104-118.
    20. Baines, Joseph & Hager, Sandy Brian, 2021. "Commodity Traders in a Storm: Financialization, Corporate Power and Ecological Crisis," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, issue Latest Ar.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:41:y:2024:i:2:d:10.1007_s10460-023-10514-7. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.