The Drought Information System for Southern South America (Sissa) gave an alarming number on the drought that is spreading through the Argentine territory, commenting that 55% of the national territory is suffering from the lack of rain. For this reason, reprofile communicated with the agricultural journalist, Hector Huergo who admitted that “The situation is very critical. It’s the worst time to have a drought like this, which is having a very strong impact.”
“Important losses have already materialized in the wheat and barley harvestbut fundamentally regarding wheat, half of the harvest has been lost and what is left to export is very little,” explained the interviewee. This decrease is equivalent to the field “a loss of 3 billion dollars, which has already materialized, there is no turning back”.
Although there were rains in some sectors of the country that lessened the impact of the droughts, at the general level the situation continues to be delicate. “Specifically what has been lost is the 35 percent of the possible harvest. if we waited 150 million tons, surely we will not exceed 100lWhat does it mean that between 13 and 15 billion dollars will not enter Argentina? in 2023,” he said.
“The main issue here is that the State captures income from the field through withholdings and the differential in the exchange rate, that with this 100 percent gap, the State keeps half of what is produced, while with withholdings in the case of soybeans it keeps 35 percent.” But of all that money, “if 10 percent had been invested in infrastructure, the situation would be different“, sentenced the journalist. And added: “Of 6 or 7 million hectares we are only irrigating one hectare“.
Regarding the destination of the withholdings that are applied to agriculture, Hector Huergo explained that, “goes to general revenue, which is political spending“, “in the last 20.21 years since the withholdings were reimposed on the field, they took 2 billion dollars“. However, with only 10 percent of that money, the interviewee concluded that, “Today they might be irrigating 10 million hectares.”
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