MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Supreme Court to rule on Argentine farmers' conflict controversy

Supreme Court in Bs. Aires

Argentina's Supreme Court accepted competence on the sliding export taxes on grains and oilseeds question, which triggered the farmers' conflict, and will consider a demand presented by an Argentine province which argues they “undermine federal taxes co-participation”, according to Justice sources quoted in Buenos Aires La Nacion.

"The Court recognizes it has the obligation to act as a first tribunal. The demand has been passed on to the Argentine state which has 60 days to reply", a judicial source was quoted. In the resolution the Court admits it accepted the request from the province of San Luis because "matters between provinces or with the State" must be addressed by the Court as an "originating case". The San Luis province which is ruled by a dissident sector from the Justicialista Party chaired by Mr. Nestor Kirchner, President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner claims the export levies system on agricultural exports is "unconstitutional" because it undermines federal taxes co-participation and therefore is "extensive to all export levies applied by the Argentine state since January 11 of 2002". The Court makes extensive her competence in the matter to all decisions that levied export duties from January 2002, of national bills which successively extended the public accounts emergency (Bill 25.561) and the delegation of powers which the Customs Code in its article 755 authorizes. The two month old demand also asks for the ruling to make the federal government pay the province of San Luis the difference between what was really collected following on the federal tax co-participation and what should had been handed if the export levies had not been charged. The Supreme Court decision follows a ruling from Federal judge Liliana Heiland which declared the Argentine government-imposed sliding-scale food export duty unconstitutional, in response to a lawsuit filed by a farmer from the Buenos Aires province city of 9 de Julio. In her ruling, the judge mentioned that the modification of the export duty scheme valid until March was a fiscal matter where Congress should have been allowed to have a say. The 23-page ruling was ratified Monday. The petition was filed by farmer Santiago Emilio Gallo Llorente on behalf of the rural establishment La Genara SRL, owner of 917 hectares, 320 of which are sown with second-quality soy soon to be harvested. The Argentine State tried to repeal the verdict, but judge Heiland answered: "Here it is not a matter of analyzing whether or not the 'sliding-scale' system is convenient or not, but rather whether it contributes to an equitable distribution of wealth".