Members of the liaison table, after the meeting with Massa / Telam
“We are here to listen to each other and resolve,” said the Minister of Economy, Sergio Massa, at the beginning of the meeting he held with the leaders of the Liaison Table at the INTA Castelar headquarters, in the midst of the drought that affects the interior productive, and that in the coming months will also have an impact on the rest of the economy. Along with members of his economic team, the official recognized the seriousness of the situation, with the impact on different productive activities, and called on the countryside to form part of working groups to build future measures.
Given the urgency posed by the problem and the claim of the representatives of agricultural producers for “concrete measures”, the head of the Palacio de Hacienda promised to announce measures on February 1, after next Monday and until that At that time, different work meetings are held, with the focus on tax, financial issues and other tools that the field needs to get out of the difficult situation.
“It was positive”
After yesterday’s meeting, the farm leaders pointed out that it “was positive”, because it was possible to form a working group to provide points of view in relation to the proposals that the Government is preparing, and also added the commitment Sergio Massa’s announcement of measures at the beginning of next month. But also, there was the feeling that they withdrew convinced that many of the decisions that they are asking of the Government will not be carried out. And in that aspect the issue of withholdings could be included.
In this sense, the Minister of Economy gave some kind of signal during yesterday’s meeting by mentioning that many of the claims made by the Liaison Desk at the press conference in recent hours, “are quick and easy to resolve on the part of ours, and there are others that are more difficult to solve and in any case what we can do is work on a short-term palliative perspective and longer-term perspectives”.
The leaders of the 4 entities of the liaison table (CRA, SRA, FAA and Coninagro) expressed their expectations that relief measures for producers suffering from the drought that affects the entire country will be announced in the coming days, as the official promised. In this sense, the president of the Argentine Rural Confederations (CRA), Jorge Chemes, highlighted the “commitment” of the Government so that on February 1 there will be concrete responses to the claims, based on an agenda on different issues that will begin to be addressed. jointly from this coming Monday, January 22. “This is not unimportant, because at least it envisions progress on what we are asking for.”
On this, he added: “Awareness is being raised about the seriousness, and that obviously this climate problem not only affects the producer’s pocket, but also the country’s resources are compromised. For this reason, I believe that together we all have to find an urgent solution, because otherwise we are going to find ourselves in serious trouble”.
For his part, the president of the Argentine Rural Society (SRA), Nicolás Pino, explained that they requested different relief measures, such as the elimination of the advance payment of Profits and the elimination of regulations that make credit more expensive.
withholdings
Regarding the withholding issue, he commented that the SRA left Massa with an economic study by which they could be reduced by half, with the same fiscal cost that the “soybean dollar” had.
“We express the needs of the country’s agricultural producers to overcome this crucial moment,” emphasized the ruralista.
Meanwhile, the head of the Argentine Agrarian Federation (FAA), Carlos Achetoni, asserted: “The most important thing (of the meeting) is that we were able to talk about urgent issues, that it is about quickly assisting the producer so that he can continue in activity, and structural ones, such as export duties, that there be a single exchange parity and the creation of multi-risk insurance”.
In turn, the president of Coninagro, Elbio Laucirica, clarified that for some tax claims there were some legal impediments, since they do not depend on a resolution, but on the approval of the Legislative Power. “For this reason, one of the commitments we have is to be able to bring any of these projects to Congress.”
