Brazilian farmers know that economic decisions made in our capital city of Brasilia matter to us as much as the weather.
That’s why we may determine the winner of our presidential election on Sunday, October 25, when challenger Flavio Bolsonaro faces incumbent Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, popularly known as “Lula.”
Anything can happen, but Bolsonaro is poised to prevail. In first-round voting on October 4, he led 47 percent to Lula’s 45 percent. The next round is a runoff between just the two of them.
Farmers could make the difference. One analysis attributes Bolsonaro’s early success to “the booming agribusiness heartlands of the center-west.”
That’s where I live. I’m not a member of Bolsonaro’s party, but I grow soybeans, corn, cotton, and sugarcane as well as raise beef cattle. I see the strength of Bolsonaro’s support among farmers and ranchers here and around the nation. In the ten states that account for more than 80 percent of Brazil’s agricultural production, Bolsonaro won eight of them in the first round. In the ten top states for cattle, he won nine.
A municipal-level comparison of official TSE election results with IBGE’s 2025 agricultural data provides a more detailed picture. In three separate rankings—the 500 largest soybean, corn, and sugarcane-producing municipalities—Flávio Bolsonaro received more votes than Lula in 434 municipalities, or 86.8%, in each ranking. Among the 500 municipalities with the largest cattle herds, he led in 384, or 76.8%. These figures describe the votes of the entire municipal electorate, not the voting preferences of individual farmers.
These results don’t tell us how every farmer voted, but they reveal an important political pattern—and a growing realization among farmers that we can achieve a great deal when we unite in support of private property, free enterprise, and regulatory relief.
Many of us have pursued economic freedom for decades. In 1990, when I was Brazil’s Minister of Agriculture, we began to dismantle a system of government controls that held back farmers. Our reforms unleashed entrepreneurial talents among the stewards of the land.
The results represent one of the world’s best economic stories. In 1990, we exported only about 4 million tons of soybeans. By 2020, that figure had topped 80 million tons. Over the same period, beef exports surged from less than 50,000 tons to about 1.7 million tons.
None of this would have been possible without private investment and a growing international demand for our food. New technologies also have played an essential role, with the advent of GM crops and the adoption of regenerative strategies that keep our soil healthy and sustainable.
Yet economic liberalization was indispensable in creating the conditions for this triumph.
Many farmers resist politics. We would prefer to leave politics to the politicians and do our jobs. Yet indifference is not an option. Just because you’re not interested in politics doesn’t mean that politics isn’t interested in you. We ignore politics at our peril.
The most pressing question is whether Brazilians will choose to continue advancing through competition and innovation. The bad alternative is to retreat to the old-fashioned failures of government intervention, regulatory uncertainty, and trade protectionism.
An obvious step for farmers is voting. But we have to do more. We should join agricultural organizations, engage in public policy debates, and even, when appropriate, run for office.
And we must tell our stories. Communicating with non-farmers never has been more important than it is right now.
A paradox of modern agriculture is that as farmers have become more productive, we need fewer people to produce larger amounts of food. We’re also growing more food on less land than ever before.
These are wonderful developments for consumers and conservation. But they also mean that many of our fellow citizens don’t understand agriculture. Policies often are written by people who have never planted a crop, raised an animal, or faced the financial risk of a drought.
Thousands of kilometers separate office desks in Brasilia from soybean fields in Mato Grosso. Yet the biggest distance isn’t geographical. It’s metaphorical: the vast expanse between those who understand problems from knowledge and experience and those who are unaware of their ignorance. We must watch the decrees from our capital the way we monitor weather forecasts.
Political participation doesn’t end on election day—but that’s where it starts, and Brazilian farmers have a chance on October 25 to secure their future, at least in the near term.
My message to farmers is simple: Keep your eyes on your fields, and also on the ballot box.
