MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Export financing and incentives for Argentine fisheries

Pte. CFK during Mar del Plata announcements

Argentina announced an 80 million US dollars support plan for the fishing industry to help pre finance exports with a special credit line from Banco Nacion which acts as a development bank.

However there's a catch: only companies that agree to keep the current number of workers will have access to the soft credits. President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner made the announcement during a meeting Wednesday in Mar del Plata with representatives from the fishing industry, the governors of the Patagonian provinces of Chubut and Rio Negro, Production and Interior ministers Deborah Giorgi and Florencio Randazzo and the mayor of Mar del Plata Gustavo Pulqui. "The idea is that the effort of all Argentines towards fisheries, is also the effort of the entrepreneurs who have enjoyed strong profits during the good years", said Mrs. Kirchner adding that workers are not only in the payroll of a company "but are also consumers, which sometimes is hard to grasp when jobs are considered the only adjustment variable" Cristina Fernandez recalled that fisheries in Argentina is one of the most dynamic export sectors since fish consumption is very low domestically and therefore "we need the instruments to promote the industry and pre financing exports we believe is a good option". "Businessmen have the right to make money and although we can't ask them to work at a loss, we can ask them that together with government they make an effort and help keep the virtuous circle of the economy steaming, ensuring jobs which are at the root of growth and profits", she added. "In the current world contingency we must make out the best of resources, which yesterday was self virtuous but now has become a necessity". Mrs. Kirchner's announcement follows other measures last week which include a 7 to 9% special compensation for highly industrialized fisheries exports. This automatically ends the export tax for those products contemplated in the package. The Argentine fishing industry has been asking for over two years an end to export taxes demanding they be reversed and turned into special incentives. In the first ten months of 2008 Argentina's fisheries exports totalled 1.46 billion US dollars according to the latest release from the Statistics Office, Indec. This represents a 16% over the same period a year ago. To give an idea of the importance of fisheries exports, in the same period beef and by products overseas sales totalled 1.89 billion US dollars. More specifically unprocessed fisheries and mollusc exports in the ten months to October reached 733 million US dollars, up from 603 million in the same period of 2007. Processed fish sales totalled 29 million and exports of fish and molluscs with added value 385 million US dollars.