The Senate approved a bill for the ones freight carried out by Argentine companies in Uruguay are obligatorily paid for wire transfer. Local carriers had warned that their competitors they charge trips in dollars and in cash and then change them in the blue parallel market. Favored by the exchange difference, they can offer freight rates at lower values.
The project, with a single article, indicates that all payments made for freight in the international land freight transport with Argentina must be paid in the country of registration of the vehicle by mandatory transfer through financial or banking entities.
In the statement of reasons, it states that the conditions of international markets, with the end of low interest rates worldwide, added to the monetary instability of regional markets and the public policies of some governments with their application of multiple exchange rateshave distorted the competitive conditions in professional international freight transport.
He added that this situation has generated competitive disparities in freight prices of merchandise in the international freight transport sector, which is amplified by exchange differences existing with countries with exchange rate splits.
The text indicates that the above has made the companies of international freight transport from Uruguay have been seriously affected and lost a large volume of merchandise.
Freight transport
In another point, it states that the “previous situation becomes even more inequitable, with the management of cash in paper money (and) it is necessary to adopt measures that restore conditions of fair competition for industry and work.”
Therefore, the project seeks to balance the competitive conditions for industry and national work, without increasing costs for national importers and exporters.
Carriers hassle
In August of this year, a delegation from the Chamber of International Land Transportation (Catidu) appeared before the Senate’s Transportation Commission to raise the concerns and complaints of carriers regarding their Argentine competitors.
GastĂłn Landa, one of the representatives of the union, told the senators that local companies faced a strong problem of competition due to the exchange difference.
“They are coming to Uruguay, they collect their freight in cash, they take those dollars alive and in the parallel market they make it triple (by changing them to Argentine pesos). What allows that? Lower the cost of freight and stay with the market”, he recounted.
Juan Carlos PatrĂłn, another of the carriers who was on the commission, made a statement that ended up being taken into account in the bill.
“The idea is to force them to send the currency through banking systems to Argentina, so that we don’t finance the exchange difference. is the Obligation of transfers to the country of origin for foreign companies. The only thing we would be doing is taking a mirror measure to the one that that country has with us, ”he explained.
The businessman recalled that the claims of the Uruguayan international transport companies have been made for decades.
“It is not from now that transport complains and draws attention to the authorities as to the fact that year after year it has been losing percentage of the market,” he said.
