Argentina’s main farm groups will hold a four-day sales strike this week, officials with local growers groups said on Thursday, to protest a tax hike that soy crushing companies warn will cripple investment in the key sector.
Argentine farmers from the central provinces of Cordoba and Santa Fé are back on the roads to protest the latest raft of export duties on agriculture produce and overall increase in taxes established by the recently sworn in administration of President Alberto Fernandez.
The American Soybean Association, the National Oilseed Processors Association and the North American Export Grain Association sent comments last week to the U.S. Trade Representative identifying significant barriers to U.S. exports, particularly on the trade distorting impact of Argentine Differential Export Taxes, or DETs, and the artificial advantage provided to soybean products exported from that country.
Brazil's Congress struck down this week a proposal to impose new taxes on the internal soy market after fierce opposition from the country's agricultural sector. An amendment to apply a tax known as PIS/Cofins on soybean sales to some domestic buyers had been removed from a bill to simplify taxation of Brazilian companies abroad that was passed by the lower chamber late on Tuesday.