The Impact of the PSR Rural Insurance Program on the Agricultural Productivity in the Matopiba Region of Brazil

Abstract

The present work aims to analyze the impact of a government subsidy program of rural insurance in Brazil, (called the Programa de Subvenção ao Prêmio de Seguro Rural - PSR), on the productivity of insured producers in the MATOPIBA region of the country, which encompasses four Brazilian states, Maranhão, Tocantins, Piauí and Bahia, between the years 2008 to 2019. For this, municipalities were selected that had at least one insured producer throughout the analyzed period. The variables used were the number of producers, the number of insurance policies, the planted area, the productivity obtained and the insured financial amount of the producers. The methodological procedure was based on Auto-regressive Vectors (VAR) for panel data. The results showed a concentration, of all the variables used in the research, in the state of Bahia, mainly in the municipalities of Formosa do Rio Preto and São Desidério, whose main economic activity is soy production. It was also found that the impulse response functions on productivity obtained through a shock in the other variables, except the planted area variable, the others showed positive initial (short-term) responses until the second year. The average time for responses to smooth over time occurs from the sixth year onwards.