Factors that influence the decision to produce exportables in the Chilean agricultural sector

T h i s s t u d y a n a l y z e s t h e r e l a t i v e importance of the factors that influence the decision to produce for foreign markets in the Chilean agricultural sector. Using data obtained from personal interviews with 368 farmers, the market/production decision was estimated using a multinomial logit model. Three market/production alternatives were analyzed: production aimed for the external market, production for the internal market but with expectations of being exported, and production targeted only for the internal market. Marginal effects, odds ratios and predicted probabilities were used to identify the relevance of each variable. The results showed that a producer that is male, with a higher educational level, that does not own the land, but rents it, whose farm has irrigation and is located in an area that has a high concentration of exporting producers, will have a high probability of producing exportables. However, the factor that has the highest impact on producing for the external market is the geographic concentration of exporting producers, that is, an export spillover effect. Indeed, when the concentration change from 0 to its maximum (0.26), the odds of producing exportables rather than producing traditional products increases by a factor of 70 (against a factor of 10 in the case of irrigation).