News Center

Consensus time in Argentina?
Financial Times
June 30, 2008

By Jude Webber

It is consensus time in Argentina's farm conflict, says Vice President Julio Cobos, who has emerged in the past fortnight as an unlikely mediator in the nearly four-month-old dispute. The signs, however, are of deepening conflict.

His latest remarks suggesting the government should give ground to farmers' demands will do nothing to endear him to President Cristina Fernandez and her husband N stor Kirchner, who appear bent on victory at all costs when Congress votes on the government's controversial export tariffs bill in the next few weeks.

With cracks appearing in the ruling bloc as dissident Peronists seek changes, Mr Kirchner has urged legislators not to back down. It is still too early to say how the numbers add up but it seems farmers will get backing for their cause even from politicians who would not normally support them.

The opposition Radical party says it and the other two main opposition parties have united in a common position. Oscar Aguad, leader of the Radicals in the lower house, says they will present proposals on Monday or Tuesday to scrap the government's sliding scale of export tariffs and turn the clock back. This would mean an export tariff on soy of 35 per cent, rather than 47 per cent at current prices. Even the government's supporters are circulating other critical modifications to its bill.

The government's proposals will be discussed in committee at the start of this week and are expected to go before a plenary session of Congress on Wednesday or Thursday. With full votes by both houses of Congress still weeks away and tensions running high on both sides, consensus looks unlikely to replace conflict just yet.