The Minister of Economy, Sergio Massaannounced this Saturday that from April there will be a special price of the dollar for the wine production chain, in fact a “Wine Dollar or Malbec Dollar”, further confirming other excellent news for this sector: the lifting of restrictions in the United States on the importation of Argentine must.
Massa unveiled these advances at the Coviar (Argentine Wine Corporation) ‘wine breakfast’ in Mendoza, an act attended by the local governor Rodolfo Suarez and that of Jujuy, Gerardo Moralesin addition to other guests and officials.
“I want to leave you some good news”assured the official, and commented that in addition to the Dollar Malbec, “Other decisions will be added to recover markets with a program to strengthen exporters.”
“The weather is punishing us and the measures are becoming urgent,” Massa said in Mendoza.
“As of April 1, we are going to accompany a mechanism (of foreign exchange) for the regional economies, starting with winemaking,” said the minister, who did not anticipate what the value of this differentiated exchange will be, noting that this month ” a work table will be held to define it”, without losing sight of three fundamental challenges: “Recover competitiveness, that the benefit reaches all producers and that the price of wine for the Argentine table is not affected.”
“Since April, just as we set in motion for the agro-industrial complex, we are going to accompany the wine industry,” said Massa. “Since the first of April, with exchange competitiveness, we have to have more Argentine wine in the world,” emphasized the Tigrense. The minister also spoke about strengthening the competitiveness of the sector, which may include exchange rate measures, withholdings, taxes and promotion.
In addition, he indicated that a wine harvest is expected with “a volume lower than 21% compared to last season, which had been scarce, and 34% lower than average”, and lamented that “the weather is punishing”.
“The weather is punishing us more and more frequently: frost, hail, heat waves, they have been taking away productive surface and damaging productions that had been carried out, there are 2,000 fewer vineyards throughout the country. Climate change is one of the great enemies we have and that is why we signed an agreement with Coviar to finance the network of meteorological stations to anticipate and work in terms of prevention in the medium and long term,” he added.
“The measures become urgent, climate change requires us to be proactive, otherwise thousands of producers could disappear and in that,” he added. And he warned: “If we are not proactive, thousands of producers could disappear in the coming years.” He also stressed that “the State has to intervene in favor of those who suffer from climate problems.”
In this sense, Massa announced that support for producers suffering from climate problems will be expanded “with more than 583 million pesos.” In addition, he indicated that the “crop credit program, with a credit line of 10,000 million pesos with a subsidized rate.”
“We will continue with assistance to municipalities, we have delivered 540 million,” he said. “We are putting the irrigation system into operation, to expand the area served, and we are bidding for the Luján Oeste system,” he said. The Tigrense announced a credit program for harvesting and transportation, in conjunction with the province of Mendoza, with a line of 10 billion pesos, which is added to that of the last Harvest, with the particularity of offering a single payment of 300 days and subsidized rate.
Praise to the BICE credits
On the other hand, he highlighted the BICE credits for producers, and a direct contribution from the municipalities of more than 500 million to help small producers. Massa particularly highlighted the “agreement with the United States that allows for the lifting of must restrictions” and announced that this Monday will be published the decree of the National Government that makes effective the contribution of 40 million dollars and an additional 10 million from the National State to the start-up of the Proviar II program.
Before that, Massa gave the copy of the decree to the current president of Coviar, Mario González.
“This loan that the Government will take will serve to improve productivity, with a focus on water efficiency. It will contribute to the establishment of young people in rural areas. For Coviar, active participation together with the sub-executing agency (INV) and the Government is very important for the next five years, guaranteeing transparency, as happened in the first successful stage of this program,” explained González.
NA/HB
You may also like
Source link
