Strategies for the internationalization of agro-food firms: an analytical model

• Grant number: 18/07759-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research
• Start date: September 01, 2018
• End date: December 31, 2018
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Production Engineering
• Principal Investigator: Mario Otavio Batalha
• Grantee: Mario Otavio Batalha
• Host Investigator: Bruno Larue
• Host Institution: Centro de Ciências Exatas e de Tecnologia (CCET). Universidade Federal de São Carlos (UFSCAR). São Carlos , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Université Laval, Canada

Abstract

The agro-food system (AFS) is responsible for an important part of GDP and financial surpluses in trade balances of Brazil and Canada. Thus, the growing world demand for food is an opportunity for the internationalization of agro-food companies from both countries. The theoretical debate that discusses the internationalization of firms has mobilized researchers from several areas of knowledge. However, researches dealing with the impact of idiosyncratic factors originating from industry specifities, such as those of AFS, in the internationalization processes are rare. From a theoretical point of view, it is intended that the results of the study proposed here may contribute to the construction of analytical models of internationalization processes that take into account the specificities of the agroindustrial sector. From the empirical point of view, we expect this research to bring contributions to the formulation of public and private policies aimed at promoting success in the process of internationalization of agro-food firms. The project aims to gather knowledge related to the various theories of internationalization of firms with those derived from the theory of resource-based vision (RBV) to construct a model of analysis of the internationalization process that takes into account the specificities of agro-food firms. The methodology of this project comprises three stages: (i) a systematic literature review on the subject; (ii) the construction of the analytical model and (iii) case studies to test the model.