Using the commodity chain concept, this paper demonstrates how the development of the sugarcane industry in Brazil during the colonial period created links between producers, merchants and consumers of many commodities in America, Africa, Europe and Asia, thus contributing to the development of a capitalist world-economy in which the production of sugar in the colony was a part of. As a basis to this thesis, it is claimed that activities which are normally regarded as autonomous, such as the production for internal markets and the slave trade, are, in fact, part of the sugar commodity chain.
Brazil; Colonial economy; World-economy; Sugar-cane; Global commodity chain
