The agroindustry, that is, the industry of processing of agricultural products, plays an important role in the economy of a developing country. However, the location theory of manufacturing, as developed to date, is not applicable to this type of manufacturing. This paper attempts to examine this neglected aspect of the location theory of manufacturing. The model is built on a framework that is adopted by most previous studies on production location, except that one of the inputs is of the von Thunen type, that is, produced over space and initially sold to consumers in the town. The location behavior of an agroindustrial firm is systematically analyzed. Moreover, and more importantly, a comparison of an agroindustrial firm with its non-agroindustrial counterpart is presented, demonstrating clearly that in many respects, the location behaviors of these two categories of manufacturing are significant different.
