The provincial government presented this Tuesday a credit line for the dairy sector at a 0% rate, subsidised by the Government of Santa Fe through the Bank of Investment and Foreign Trade (BICE), and which is articulated through the financing programme ‘Santa Fe Activa’. The novelty of this line is that producers who take credits, oriented to productive investment and acquisition of machinery, will be able to pay it back in litres of milk. The Government of Santa Fe will subsidise 100 % of the rate of the line.
The signing of the agreement took place in the White Hall of the Municipality of Esperanza and the event was attended by the Ministers of Productive Development, Gustavo Puccini; and Economy, Pablo Olivares; the Secretary of Planning and Management for Productive Development and Bioeconomy of the Nation, Juan Alberto Pazo; and the mayor of the city of Esperanza, Rodrigo Müller, among others.
Those interested will be able to access credits of up to 250 million for the purchase of machinery; and up to 50 million for productive investment.
The credits are aimed at producers who sell to plants adhered to the BICE operation. The quota payment will be with litres of milk at the value of the milk price according to the SIGLeA system; with a term of up to 60 months, including the grace period; and with a grace period for capital payment of up to 6 months. The interest rate is 0% (the Ministry of Productive Development of Santa Fe subsidises 100% of the rate).
More tools for dairy farmers
‘This is a demonstration of how to work with a national government when there is a province that manages. We go to Buenos Aires every week, we have always had the opportunity to meet, to raise projects, and to raise the problems we have’, acknowledged Puccini. The Santa Fe minister went on to say that ‘we have a programme that came from the previous administration; we called it Caminos Productivos (Productive Roads).
There is an investment of 8,000 million pesos that we are putting on the roads with priority where there are dairy farms. There are already 130 dairy farms that have benefited, and we are going to incorporate a budget of 4,000 million pesos more’; also “we have signed credits with the Bank of Santa Fe for the dairy sector: 4,000 million pesos have already been used up and are pre-agreed for disbursement”, and “this with the BICE confirms another very important tool for the sector: 4,000 million more are coming for investment and capital”.
Predictability
In turn, the Minister of Economy explained that ‘we are presenting an instrument that was developed based on the understanding that this is a sector that requires financing, but not just any financing; these are sectors that have an oscillation of prices in their activity and that can sometimes have financing that can be cheap in terms of interest rates, but that later the cycle of their business, especially prices, can turn into a problem’.
Financing the private sector
Finally, Pazo said that ‘with the Government of Santa Fe we have been working from day one to understand how to get production going, and that is a daily concern. Argentina will not grow if there is no financing for the private sector; Argentina will not grow if the private sector does not grow’. He stressed in this regard that ‘today we are happy to be able to tell you that withholding taxes have been eliminated to zero for the entire dairy industry forever, without date’.
The national official added that ‘we sought to understand what the best way for a producer was to access this financing, understanding that producers are not specialists in the financial market: what we know is to produce, so what better tool than to take out a loan that you are going to pay in what you know you produce’.
Attendees
After the signing, the authorities toured the ‘Santa Teresita’ establishment. The activities were also attended by the senator for the department of Las Colonias, Rubén Pirola; the provincial deputy Jimena Senn; the secretary of Agriculture and Livestock of the province, Ignacio Mántaras; the provincial directors of Dairy, Carlos de Lorenzi; of Legal Affairs and Productive Development, Leila Widder; and of Rural Infrastructure, Roberto Tion; and the dean of the Faculty of Veterinary Science of the National University of Litoral, Sergio Parra, among others.
