Juan Carlos Muñoz, a member of River and Maritime Shipowners, assured that so far the neighboring country has not demonstrated the alleged work that it claims to have carried out to implement a toll for circulation on the waterway.
“Despite the efforts of the authorities, with Argentina it is a very complicated situation,” he said in an interview with the GEN channel. Juan Carlos Munoz, who said he was skeptical that it would come to fruition. “The ideal scenario of sitting down as good neighbors to redirect this seems distant,” he added.
In his opinion, the free navigability agreement of 31 years ago was not respected by Argentina. “The political and economic situation in Argentina does not help at all,” he added about this irregular measure that affects our country.
After exhausting all instances, a long and uncertain mechanism is expected to reverse the toll, according to the interviewee. The worst scenario is to pay 50 million dollars more for logistics and that will harm the country’s competitivenessnarrowed.
In the interview, he remarked that the works that the Argentines allege for the collection of the toll have not been carried outtaking into account that to date they have not demonstrated the work order and the details of deepening the waterway.
Related note: Argentina reaffirms its decision to charge tolls on the waterway
The Minister of Transportation of Argentina, Diego Giuliano, ratified the decision of the Government of that country, to continue charging a toll for circulation on the waterway.
He maintained that it is not a tariff and that nor does it affect the free navigation of the rivers. He also assured that there is no discrimination based on flags, Therefore, the tariff difference is established between national cabotage and international traffic, supposedly without ignoring multilateral agreements in the Basin.
To this is added that the Argentine Justice rejected, in second instance, a precautionary request filed by Paraguayan shipping companies, arguing that the collection is not a tax, but of a toll and that they did not find evidence of economic damage to Paraguayan companies.
