Publication Type

Journal Article

Version

publishedVersion

Publication Date

1-2022

Abstract

The literature on contract farming (CF) has to date focused on how outside capital uses CF to vertically integrate non-capitalist producers into agro-industrial value chains. We argue that in places where multiple dynamics of capitalist growth co-exist, CF relationships can also emerge between different types of capitalist producers that are already in capitalist production using other organizational forms. In this situation, the well-studied drivers that fuel the spread of CF become less consequential; the emergence of CF is instead more contingent on the complex interactions between producers and the specific conditions and events in the local environment. We conceptualize the emergence of this type of CF as a coevolutionary process and develop an analytical toolkit from this perspective to study the rise of CF in industrial pig farming in a Chinese county. Our analysis traces the evolution of agro-industrialization over a decade (2006–2016) and shows the emergence of CF as a coevolutionary outcome shaped by the unique biography of the contract producers, the “historical accident” of a market downturn, and the reciprocal responses between contract producers and agribusinesses.

Keywords

agribusiness, agro-industrialization, China, coevolution, contract farming, pork

Discipline

Agribusiness | Agricultural and Resource Economics | Asian Studies

Research Areas

Sociology

Publication

Journal of Agrarian Change

Volume

22

Issue

1

First Page

97

Last Page

117

ISSN

1471-0358

Identifier

10.1111/joac.12457

Publisher

Wiley

Copyright Owner and License

Publisher

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1111/joac.12457

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