President Alberto Fernández asked the ministers this Wednesday to “redouble efforts and prioritize management” in order to meet the needs of the most vulnerable sectors, when participating in the Cabinet meeting that took place in the Eva Perón Room of the Pink House.
The meeting started at 7.40 and was headed by the chief of staff Juan Manzur, with the presence of almost all the ministers of the Executivewhile the President joined in the final stretch of the meeting, according to official sources.
At the conclusion of the conclave, Manzur made statements to the accredited press media at Government House, announcing that “positive indicators” had been recorded in recent days in relation to the evolution of public works and registered employment.
Accompanied by the Ministers of Security, Aníbal Fernández, and Labor, Claudio Moroni, and the spokesperson for the Presidency, Gabriela Cerruti, the Chief of Staff anticipated that the National Government would take measures in the next few hours to counteract the lack of diesel in some provinces.
That announcement was made shortly after through a statement released from the Ministry of Economy, which reported the decision to raise by 50% the mandatory cut of biofuels established in Law 27,640 (it will go from 5% to 7.5% for small and medium-sized companies)in order to increase the supply of diesel.
In his statements to the press, Manzur described the Cabinet meeting as “extremely positive” and said that they received “instructions to each of the areas by the President of the Nation.”
“The President meets daily with each of the ministers and their officials and collaborators. In this meeting it was very important to have his presence,” he stressed.
Manzur also referred to the impact that “the complex international context” has on the management of the Government as a product of the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia.
“All the indications were based on the management of the Government and each of the areas. Our President is a man who knows the management in detail and, therefore, they were very specific questions. The formal request was to redouble efforts in terms of management and, obviously, prioritizing the actions that have the greatest impact and favoring the most vulnerable social groups,” Manzur said.
“The formal request was to redouble efforts in terms of management and, obviously, prioritizing actions that have the greatest impact and giving priority to the most vulnerable social groups”John Manzur
The chief of staff pondered, in another order, the rise in the generation of jobs that has been registered for some months, and affirmed that “one million 200 thousand new workers were incorporated” into the labor market.
Regarding a consultation on the construction of the Néstor Kirchner gas pipeline, he maintained that it is a “priority work” and assured that “the political decision and the resources are available for the project to materialize.”
Along these lines, he warned that today the “energy supply” is a topic that is discussed worldwide and recalled that the values of fuels were “altered” as a result of the war that is taking place in Eastern Europe.
About the variation of the dollar, Manzur exposed the problems “on a global level due to the volatility in the markets” and considered in this regard that “Argentina is not an island”.
“The national government has been on a path to stabilize the macroeconomy. First, the agreement was made with the bondholders by which interest rates were reduced and that had an impact on expenditures. This made it possible to save hundreds of billions of dollars “, he assured.
He also alluded to the agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and emphasized that the Government of the Front for All (FdT) “had not taken that debt”, referring to the loan for more than US$44,000 million contracted by the administration of former President Mauricio Macri.
“We achieved the best possible agreement on the path of stabilizing the macroeconomy. We are seeing how to continue and accompany the growth of Argentina. In the first quarter we grew more than six points and last year we did it by more than ten points. That means that increase the demand for fuel. What we are doing is increasing imports and Argentina’s production capacity,” said the coordinating minister.
On the other hand, Manzur confirmed that, at the Cabinet meeting, “the chapters related to what has to do with employment and public works were analyzed”.
“Currently there are more than 5,000 works in Argentina. And Minister Jorge Ferraresi made a very detailed detail of the progress of a central chapter such as housing. He mentioned to us that, by July, the Government is expected to complete 50,000 homes These data are important to compare with other efforts”, he observed.
For his part, Moroni – who was recently in Geneva, Switzerland, where he attended the Assembly of the International Labor Organization (ILO) – affirmed that the progress of employment “is becoming more dynamic in Argentina”.
“The private salaried employment rate has been growing at 0.3/4%. That means a little more than 20,000 new jobs per month. In the case of construction, more than 20 months of uninterrupted growth have been verified, and the industry has also grew during the last 13 months,” he said.
Finally, the Security Minister, Aníbal Fernández, maintained that the actions carried out due to the arrival of a Venezuelan plane at Ezeiza were the “correct” ones and reported that the identity checks on the crew did not give results “that modify what had happened ” Until now.
