MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentina en route to become the “Greece of Latin America” claim Chilean exporters

Fantuzzi, in March manufactured goods’ exports to Argentina dropped 16% from a year ago

Argentina could rapidly become the “Greece of Latin America” given the trade restrictions it has imposed born out of the lack of sufficient hard currency to face its international commitments, according to Chile’s Manufacturing and Services Exporters Association, Roberto Fantuzzi.

“So far this year (Chilean) manufactured exports to Argentina keep falling, which anticipates a further drop in April. We must begin to acknowledge that Argentina could become the Greece of Latin America since its crisis of lack of hard currency is affecting all of its neighbours, manufacturing exports to Argentina are in a free fall”, said Fantuzzi.

Since last February first, all Argentine importers must present anticipated sworn statements before any operation which is neither a guarantee of approval on time or in volume by the bureaucratic system mounted to decide on each request. This has caused a serious fall in export volume to Argentina for Chilean companies and items, points out Fantuzzi.

Chilean stats show that during March exports to Argentina dropped 16% equivalent to 86 million dollars compared to the 102 million of March 2011. The fall is also felt by exporting companies, whose number has dropped 31%. A year ago the number of Chilean manufacturing companies making business with Argentina totalled 516, now that number has dropped to 358. Comparing the first quarters of the two years it represents a drop of 18%.

Likewise with the number of items: while in February-March 2011 the number of manufactured items exported to Argentina was 1.514, in 2012, the number has dropped to 1.228, and if March only is considered the contraction is equivalent to 35%.

Regarding the number of export operations, since the system of anticipated sworn statements was implemented by Argentina, the drop reached 33.8% compared to a year ago, but if only March is considered, operations fall 47%: in 2011, 5.889 operations vs 3.130 in March 2012.

Finally Fantuzzi said that “Argentine protectionism is an illness that risks spreading to the rest of Latin America. Each time we face more obstacles to export, with Argentina completely ignoring the free trade agreements they have subscribed”.