How to assess agribusiness distress in Brazil

01

Start with the crop calendar and the actual payment calendar

Build a calendar by producer, farm, crop and crop year. Record the planting window, cash dates for seed and fertilizer, field operations, harvest, storage, delivery, settlement and the next planting decision. Conab’s regional crop progress bulletins are useful context. For the farm itself, use field records, contracts, agronomist assessments and confirmed logistics. The physical harvest date and the bank value date can be weeks apart.

Map the point where cash reaches its low, and the last day financing can still buy inputs for the next crop. A four-week maturity extension can prevent a forced sale if grain is about to be paid for. The same extension may do little if the next unrestricted receipts arrive three months later or if the farm has already missed the planting window. Run near-term cash weekly and connect it to a separate calendar covering the full crop cycle.

Sources for this section: Conab: weekly crop progress and state-level planting and harvest context

02

Stress volume, price, foreign exchange and delivery together

Estimate deliverable tonnes from the planted area, current yield assessment, quality discounts and losses between field and delivery. Assign tonnes to physical delivery contracts first, then calculate how much crop remains to sell. For open tonnes, use the net farm price after local basis, freight, drying, storage and quality deductions. Track the exchange rate for each cash flow that actually uses it: export-linked selling prices, imported inputs, debt service and hedge settlements may move at different times and in different directions.

Test combined shocks: lower yield with replacement purchases, a harvest delay with extra storage or financing cost, and weak local basis with unfavorable currency or hedge cash flows. A price hedge on expected output may create a margin call or leave a short position after crop loss. Verify units and terms before aggregating; a quote per sack, a contract in tonnes and a dollar benchmark are three inputs to reconcile.

03

Follow the CPR and the grain through to settlement

A Cédula de Produto Rural (CPR) can provide for physical delivery or financial settlement. In a barter transaction a producer receives inputs and undertakes to deliver agricultural product under the agreed terms. Read the signed CPR alongside the purchase, input or delivery agreement. Identify the issuer, beneficiary and any assignee; settlement form; quantity, quality and location; price or formula; and the security attached to the instrument. Verify the applicable CPR registration or deposit and the separate steps for documenting or perfecting each security interest.

Article 11 of Law 8,929 excludes from the effects of judicial restructuring the claims and linked security on a physical-settlement CPR with full or partial prepayment or representing a barter transaction. Article 11 also addresses restitution of the relevant goods and includes a statutory exception for a fortuitous event or force majeure proven to prevent part or all of the delivery. In a decision published in 2025, the STJ’s Third Panel held that conversion of an enforcement action into a monetary collection did not change the exclusion for the barter CPR in that case. A financially settled CPR requires its own analysis; the initials on the cover do not determine treatment.

• Match input invoices and delivery evidence to the CPR and verify whom the farmer is required to pay or deliver to.
• Reconcile tonnes by farm and delivery date against advances, purchase contracts, warehouse receipts and other security. Flag competing promises for the same tonnes.
• If claiming force majeure, document the event, affected area, causal link, affected deliveries, notices and any mitigation. Keep the insurance and legal analyses distinct.

Sources for this section: Law 8,929/1994, Articles 4-A, 11 and 12: settlement, judicial restructuring and registration · STJ, October 2025: effect of monetary enforcement on a barter CPR

04

Prove that the producer can file, then test each claim

Under STJ Repetitive Theme 1145, a producer who has carried on rural business activity for more than two years may seek recuperação judicial (RJ) if registered with the commercial registry when it files, regardless of the age of that registration. The other eligibility requirements still apply. Article 48 identifies the accounting evidence: for a legal entity, the timely tax accounting statement (ECF) or its statutory successor; for an individual, the digital rural cash book (LCDPR) or qualifying successor, income tax returns and balance sheets, with a cash-book alternative for periods when the LCDPR was not required. Reconcile records and receipts for the entity actually filing.

Eligibility and claim coverage are separate. In the cases covered by Article 48 §§2–3, Article 49 §6 limits coverage to claims arising exclusively from rural activity and identified in the specified documents. Other provisions address controlled rural credit resources, a category of prior renegotiations, and debt incurred in the three years before filing to acquire rural property, together with its guarantees. Test the funding source, purpose, timing, documents and exceptions claim by claim. A distributor, processor, landholding company or family member needs a separate analysis; membership in a farm group does not establish a common result.

CNJ Provimento 216/2026 sets national guidelines for first-instance courts. Article 8 calls for an operating report at filing and disclosure of security over current and future crops or livestock, together with the production outlook. Connect those disclosures to land-use records, invoices, production history and credit documents. Where the judge orders preliminary verification under Article 51-A, the review covers actual operations and the filing documents. Article 10 of the CNJ rule identifies crop outlook, existing forward contracts and security among the evidence for that review. Once the case is proceeding, Article 12 calls for the judicial administrator to address the crop cycle and the status of security in monthly reporting.

Sources for this section: Law 11,101/2005, Articles 48, 49 and 51–51-A: proof, claim perimeter and verification · CNJ Provimento 216/2026, Articles 8, 10 and 12: rural filing and crop reporting guidelines · STJ Repetitive Theme 1145: rural activity and commercial registration

05

Identify what the lender can actually realize

List collateral by owner and location: land, equipment, crops, warehouse inventory, receivables and guarantees from third parties. For each, obtain the document and evidence of registration where applicable, senior rights, a realizable valuation, storage or removal costs, and any enforceability questions. Distinguish a mortgage or pledge from fiduciary ownership or assignment. Check whether there is a relevant order and what it says about enforcement and the continued use of an asset.

Article 49 §3 addresses specified ownership-based rights and a temporary restriction for essential capital goods. Do not read the restriction as a general right to retain pledged stock or sell grain free of existing rights. The STJ has held in cases involving a producer’s finished soybean and corn output that the goods were the product of the activity rather than capital goods used to produce it. When an asset is needed for the next crop, document what it does, where it is, whether it can be replaced and what the operative order permits.

Sources for this section: Law 11,101/2005, Articles 6 and 49: enforcement and essential capital goods · STJ: soybean and corn output distinguished from essential capital goods

06

Use lender disclosures to ask better questions about rollover

Banco do Brasil’s second-quarter 2026 report shows an agribusiness loan portfolio of R$421.6 billion at June 2026 and a reported delinquency ratio for loan balances more than 90 days past due of 6.27%, compared with 3.16% a year earlier. Those are figures reported by the bank for its own agribusiness portfolio. In August 2026 it separately announced a renegotiation program for eligible producers and cooperatives affected by climate or market losses. For a lender or investor, the practical question is how much of the portfolio is past due, already extended or eligible for new terms. These measures answer different questions about repayment and rollover.

On the farm, ask for the exact program and funding source on each debt instrument. The Central Bank’s Rural Credit Manual addresses extensions in defined circumstances and includes conditions tied to evidence of repayment difficulty and capacity. Confirm the current rule, programme-specific requirements, evidence and application timing. After a weather event, assemble dated agronomy reports, field and delivery records, notices and any insurance or Proagro file promptly. Treat a pending extension, insurance payment or support programme as contingent until the required approvals and cash timing are documented.

Sources for this section: Banco do Brasil, second-quarter 2026 MD&A (English), Table 54 and Figure 41: agribusiness portfolio and delinquency · Banco do Brasil, 26 August 2026: historical announcement of rural credit renegotiations · Central Bank Rural Credit Manual, especially MCR 2-6 and the rules for the specific programme · Central Bank: Proagro and the role of financial agents

07

Make the next planting decision with committed funding

Separate the money that carries the business to harvest from the payments owed to historical lenders. Consider whether the producer can buy inputs, secure harvesting and haulage, and keep enough of the next crop’s proceeds to pay operating costs. Test who can consent to new security, whether there is any collateral capacity, and how cash will be controlled. If the next planting window will close before approval, put a smaller or alternate operating plan on the table while there is time to execute it.

• Obtain a weekly cash forecast plus a crop-cycle model, a tonnes-to-cash bridge and a downside case with delayed collections.
• Request one claim and security matrix for each borrower, with evidence of the funding source and how each debt was used.
• Set decision dates for input purchase, insurer or lender notice, committed funding and delivery shortfalls. Name an owner for each.

When a producer or investor needs to align the crop calendar with a debt proposal, Ritus Partners ↗ (opens in a new tab), a PreservaCred restructuring partner, can be a point of contact for assessing seasonal liquidity and coordinating the financial and operating work of a turnaround.