Determinants of the separation of ownership and decision management in Brazilian farmer-owned cooperatives

Abstract

Brazilian agricultural cooperatives are by and large characterized as complex organization with diffuse ownership. However, 48% of them do not segregate the owners from management, which goes against what is stated in the dominant theoretical precepts for similar companies, regardless of whether they are cooperatives or not. This paper investigates the determinants of the segregation between ownership and management in those organizations. As the segregation process involves different agency relations, the authors used the logit and tobit models respectively, in order to study what drives the delegation of formal control rights to boards of directors and what factors affect the segregation of the decision-making process between board members and the CEO. Our findings show, among other things, that complexity and diffuse ownership do not explain the level of segregation of ownership and management, unlike what occurs in joint stock companies. In contrast, the characteristics of the board of directors (size, formal allocation of authority, limits on reelection, reputation and effort) are relevant to explain the segregation level. As this is an initial quantitative study about governance control in agricultural cooperatives, further empirical research is advised.