No More Imported Food

"Brazilian hearts of palm, yes.  Spanish ham, no." That's the new slogan of Guillermo Moreno, the Argentine Interior Secretary of Commerce, according to today's La Nacion.  Recently, Moreno has been contacting major supermarket chains in Buenos Aires informing them of his decision to prevent the entry of imported foods that have an Argentine domestic equivalent.

Moreno seems to be very clear that this new policy will be in effect June 1.

Italian pasta?  Sorry, eat fideos.  French cheese?  Nope, we make that here.  German beer?  Get real; Quilmes!  Spanish olive oil?  No dice.  Swiss chocolates?  Talk to Ricardo Fort.

I hope he doesn't think that Argentine hot peppers are the equivalent of anything!

As usual, Moreno won't put it in writing, just over the phone.  To make sure that it happens, he says that he will use the Argentine FDA (Anmat) to impound the imported food items on his list.  Moreno doesn't have any authority over Anmat ...but that hasn't stopped him in the past from giving other agencies orders.

The La Nacion article goes on to say that the situation first raised its ugly head when major chains had difficulty bringing in canned and frozen corn from Brazil, a Mercosur partner.  Although Argentina doesn't produce enough sweet corn to meet internal demand, the big supermercados were told that was their tough luck.

Moreno blamed the weakening euro and the burgeoning economic crisis in Greece, Spain, and Italy.  He said that Argentina could be swamped with cheap imported food from those countries.

Supermarkets warned that the new rule would have unintended consequences. "If I can't import Italian pastas anymore, domestic manufacturers will want to charge me more for their products," said a buyer for a leading chain.

To the old joke about hell being a place where the police are German, the chefs are British, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss, and it's all organized by the Italians ...we might have to add "and the grocers are Argentine."