The growth process of soybean production and the need for efficiency in its flow, coupled to a lower total logistics costs, demand the development of an operational plan that demarcates the areas of influence of the ports, the Hinterlands, and maintain market stability. However, the lowest total logistics costs for production flow are not respected in some scenarios due to restrictions of the multimodal transportation. Correspondingly, future projects to implement new routes for the production flow, bounded by investments in multimodal transport, installation of new ports and terminals cargo transshipment, are interfering in these areas of influence increasing business dynamics. This study aims to characterize the dynamics of the flow of production routes, list their interference, map the discussion about the concept of hinterlands and present methodologies for its delimitation. The proposed model will be applied to all ports participating in the foreign trade of soybeans in 2011, with emphasis on the VALE S/A Pier 3. The expected results should answer two fundamental questions: 1) what is the importance of VALE S/A Pier 3 regarding the distribution of the Brazilian harvest, and the competitiveness of total logistics costs? 2) The terminal will be needed in the future?
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