June 23, 2008

Hardline farm group ends boycott in Argentina

Argentine farmers in the key locale of Gualeguaychu in Entre Rios will end their three-month boycott on grain sales at midnight Saturday, a prominent local leader of the nationwide rural protest movement said Friday (June 19, 2008).

Alfredo D'Angeli, the head of the Entre Rios chapter of the Argentine Agrarian Federation and one of the most high-profile and hardline farm activists, said he hoped that other farmers and organizations would follow his group's lead. The gesture, he said, was to facilitate a congressional debate over the hike in soy export taxes that prompted the farmers' long-runnning protest in March.

"As of midnight, we will end the cessation on grains commercialization," D'Angeli said, adding that his people would "leave the highways" from which they have periodically imposed blockades on grains transport.

However, he also suggested that farmers continue to withhold a significant portion of the harvested grains because for now, the new, higher export tax rate remains in place.

Whether the move will prompt truck owners to end their related two-week blockade of transit points around the country is unknown. The blockade has caused severe shortages of food and other supplies in supermarkets and stores throughout Argentina.

The truck owners launched their measure to try to force the government and the farmers to reach an agreement that would restore their now paralyzed grains freight business.

For his part, D'Angeli said he believed his move would lead to the reappearance of milk, beef, flour and other products now lacking on supermarket shelves. But he was quick to point out that the farmers were never responsible for the shortages, contrary to the government's claims.

A recent media campaign sponsored by the ruling Peronist Party showed the faces of national leaders for the four main farm groups with the ads describing leaders as "four gentlemen who want to deny milk to Argentine children."

D'Angeli's move comes as Congress debates next week over the government's reforms to the tax bills.

President Cristina Fernandez sent the controversial bill to Congress saying lawmakers could only vote for or against the changes,

But in recent days, legislators have made it clear they will consider exercising their constitutional right to introduce amendments to the bill.

According to news reports Friday, provincial governors and lawmakers are looking for a compromise agreement that would bring down the tax rate from the government's level.

Dismissing claims that he had threatened government-allied lawmakers with protests next week, D'Angeli said his people would simply "accompany" lawmakers.