Linking land investments, supply chains, and deforestation: Insights from soy land deals in South America

This study investigates large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs) for soy production in Argentina and Brazil, analysing investor origin, trade destinations, and links to deforestation risk. This analysis combines data from the Land Matrix, TRASE, and ORBIS and applies a spatially explicit approach to link investor, trade, deforestation, and soy cultivation data to LSLAs and analyse their geographic and quantitative relationships. We find that domestic investors account for the majority (54.7%) of the acquired soy-producing land, with foreign investors from the US (15.4%), the EU (5.6%), and the Gulf region (4.6%) playing smaller roles. While China emerges as a dominant export destination for soy products, it is not represented among the investor countries in our dataset. The EU accounts for a considerable share of trade (16.2%) and a moderate share of investment (5.6%). Our results show that the origins of investments in LSLAs are largely decoupled from the destination of the products. We also find that 14.2%, or 269,350 ha, of the total soy production area in our sample is likely linked to deforestation, with only 2.2% destined for EU markets. Our findings highlight the need for coordinated multilateral governance that accounts for actors at multiple levels, effective supply chain measures, and regulation of domestic investors. These insights contribute to ongoing efforts to design more inclusive and effective governance of global agricultural commodity networks.