Susanna Hecht, professor of urban planning at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, commented in an Americas Quarterly feature on the history of Brazil’s soybean industry and its half-century of expansion to become one of the leading producers of soy worldwide. Hecht, an expert on the political ecology of Latin American tropics — specifically Amazonia — commented on how Brazil became a soybean powerhouse, producing more than half of the global soybean supply. The story details the sector’s origins and growth under the country’s 1964-85 military dictatorship. In the 1976-77 harvest, Brazil produced 12 million metric tons of soy, nearly all of it in the south. By 2000-01, production tripled to 38.4 million, with Brazil’s center-west emerging as the lead soy-growing region. “It was [an attempt] to try to create a Midwest in Brazil,” said Hecht, a specialist on Latin American tropical development. “It’s national capital, government capital stimulating the growth.”