Análisis de la inversión en tecnología y su relación con la competitividad en empresas del sector agropecuario.

Abstract

Ecuador has a geographical location that gives it a clear advantage in the agricultural sector, which makes this one of the sectors that contributes the most to the economy and development of the country. At present, although some companies engaged in agricultural activity have tried to modernize the productive sectors through the use of technology, this process of technological transition has yet to continue developing in the country. Therefore, the present investigation aims to determine the relationship between technological investment and the competitiveness of national companies in the agricultural sector. For which, three subsectors that are part of the agricultural activities in the country were analyzed. In this sense, it was categorized into subsectors A01, which covers Agriculture, Livestock, Hunting and Related Services Activities, A02, which contains Forestry and Wood Extraction and A03 for Fishing and Aquaculture. Therefore, data were obtained from 3460 companies as a population from which financial information was collected regarding investment variables in technology and competitiveness. Subsequently, a multiple regression was developed to show the relationship between technological indicators and competitiveness indicators. Finally, a positive relationship was demonstrated between the technological net fixed assets indicator and the indicators of market share, profitability on sales and gross margin. For its part, the estimated capital efficiency coefficient showed a positive relationship with the ROA, ROE, gross margin and average labor productivity indicators. On the other hand, in both cases a negative relationship was obtained with the cost competitiveness indicator.