For Argentine farmers, Milei’s free-market reforms fall short

Twenty months after the president of Argentina, Javier Milei, came to power, promising to lead a free market revolution in the so-called South America sick, the agricultural community acts to go further.

This includes Ruben Artigues and his orchards in the Buena Moza region, two o’clock in the northwest of Buenos Aires, where orange harvest is in full swing.

The tractors come and groan under the weight of sweet navel oranges picked from the top of the trees by workers perched on scales.

Like many farmers, Artigues adopted the Milei elections in December 2023 as a victory for the free company after two decades of mainly protectionist policies in center-left.

But he believes that the gains for farmers so far have been shy and that producers “get bored”.

Agricultural products represented 58% of Argentina exports in 2024, making it a key engine of economic growth and a major source of foreign currencies.

The frustrations of farmers are mainly aimed at the multiple taxes imposed on the national, provincial and municipal levels, which say they harm their competitiveness.

During the campaign in 2023, Milei promised to reduce punishing taxes on beef and cereal exports – a long -standing source of income from the government which he called “theft” and finally delete them completely.

But the cuts were slow to come and met the expectations of the industry when he finally announced them last month.

Export taxes on poultry and beef increased from 6.75 to five percent, on corn from 12%to 9.5%, and soybeans – one of the largest agricultural exports in Argentina – from 33 to 26%.

There was also a certain relief for sorghum, sunflower seeds and by-products and soy by-products.

– from “hell” to “purgatory” –

“We were in hell and now we went up to Purgatory,” said Raul Vítores, president of the Rural Society of San Pedro.

Artigues, which lost 30% of his orange and fishing harvest this year due to a cold record in July, called “insufficient” changes.

While supervising the sorting of the oranges packed for export to Europe, he recognized that the “situation is difficult” for the economist Maverick Milei, given the poor public finances which he inherited.

“The shipment of a box of oranges from an Argentinian port costs us 40% more than our competitors in Chile, Uruguay or South Africa,” he said.

Its oranges are also a magnet for thieves who track the orchards at night.

“Producers get tired, many abandon (fruit) and praise their fields to soy producers,” said Artigues, which employs around 120 people, noting that soybean production, being less with a high intensity of labor than fruits, creates much less job.