Gastos Públicos em Agricultura: retrospectiva e prioridades

This paper aims to recast public expenditure on agriculture and the costs allocated to several aspects of agrarian organization, also indicating how the government has spent during 1980 and 2005 vis-à-vis trade, rural credit, agrarian politics, and research & development (R&D). Methodologically, we go over a series of public expenditure analyses presented in previous papers adopting the same methodology throughout the years. We conclude that expenditure was focused in a few secondary functions and in a reduced number of programs. In 2005, 88% of the total budget for agriculture was concentrated on only four programs. Several key programs on productivity, sustainability, training, and research, among others, received almost no funding. Estimates on governmental spending on farmers` debt renegotiation show overvalued costs in relation to what had been previously contracted. During 1988 and 2005, the Union`s expenditure with debt management amounted to R$ 22,60 billions. Also of note is that differently from other major countries that have progressively spent more on R&D in the last decades, Brazil has shown considerable reductions in spending in this area. During 2003 and 2005, Embrapa, the leading research center in agriculture in Brazil, has had a 14% cut in its total budget.