ARGENTINA: President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner moves to end prolonged conflict with farmers over tax hike

Record ID: 446641

  • Title: ARGENTINA: President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner moves to end prolonged conflict with farmers over tax hike
  • Date: 18th June 2008
  • Summary: (BN1) BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA (JUNE 17, 2008) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) PRESIDENT CRISTINA FERNANDEZ DE KIRCHNER SAYING: "I do not want a country, a cooperative democracy, where it is thought that it can be run from the rural society with pots and pans. You do not run a country that way."
  • Embargoed: 3rd July 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Argentina
  • Country: Argentina
  • Topics: Industry,Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVAEW4G8TNL0JORPLJ51YI5T8DHT
  • Story Text: Argentine President Cristina Fernandez moved to resolve a prolonged political conflict on Tuesday (June 17), asking Congress to ratify a tax hike on soy exports that farmers criticized as authoritarian.
    Fernandez also said the government was open to dialogue with farm groups that have protested the new tax regime for three months, but only if they lift roadblocks causing some fuel and food shortages.
    Argentina is one of the world's biggest agricultural producers, accounting for 3 percent of global farm exports. Growers have benefited from high prices for their top crop, soy.
    Fernandez says the soy tax increase adopted in March will redistribute windfall profit and alleviate poverty, but enraged farmers have frozen grains trade with their protests and the conflict has sparked wider anti-government demonstrations.

    "I will be sending to Parliament a law ... for the redistribution of profits and so that the food of all Argentines continues to be accessible for our people," Fernandez said on live television on Tuesday evening.
    Referring to the symbolic use of pots and pans as percussion instruments by demonstrators, she added: "I do not want a country, a cooperative democracy, where it is thought that it can be run from the rural society with pots and pans. You do not run a country that way."
    Farm leaders applauded the decision to involve Congress, even though Fernandez's Peronist Party has a clear majority.
    Ex-President Nestor Kirchner, who is Fernandez's husband, also publicly defended the measure as pressure mounted on the government to resolve the dispute.
    One poll published on Tuesday showed Fernandez's popularity has slumped to 20 percent, well below March levels.
    Officials have said the new tax system, which moves export levies on a sliding-scale along with global grains prices, would help lower food prices at a time of growing inflation.
    The first couple made their separate speeches a day after tens of thousands of Argentines banged pots and pans in the streets and honked their car horns in unison to protest the government's handling of the growing crisis.
    The dispute is threatening to slow Latin America's No. 3 economy, which has registered 8 percent average annual growth over the last five years, due partly to high Asian and European demand for its soy products.
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