Could it be? ARG is running out of beef? See stories below.

Or, is the country simply having to import beef from Uruguay to address both man made (thank you Mr. and Mrs. K) and natural production problems (a lingering drought). If all this is true, the next question must be: is there any difference between ARG and Uruguayan beef?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/16/wo...16uruguay.html

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/...ZX4zwD9CGL5V00

Other foreign latino cows can understand Uruguayan cows a bit better than Argentine cows.

I have no figures to back me up but from our experience and what I hear from our countryside friends prices have been so low (I can vouch for that although the prices in the shop don't reflect this) landowners are giving up rearing cattle and going into cereal production instead. One easy way of doing it is to rent the land to a cereal grower who does all the work for you. You get paid on the average price of the soya, corn or whatever based over the week the rent is due. A lot less stressful given they take most of the risk.
Last years drought did cause problems with poor natural grass growth so more hay had to be bought in to supplement their feed. Of course now the rains have come all is hunky-dory on that front but all a bit too late for some.
Other downsides of cattle farming exist as well. We lost one of our cattle a few weeks ago when it was butchered in the field so no profit to be made on that one.
Rather more worryingly is that intensive cattle farming is on the increase - I see that being more of a threat to the quality of the product than anything else. I suspect tighter profit margins has forced this change of direction.

#1. Yep, we're running out of beef.
#2. No other latina cows could better understand an Uruguayan cow than an Argentine cows (they both speak "rioplatense.")
#3. Everything that Hiddy said.

The Ag minister is going to announce Friday whether Argentina will eliminate beef exports altogether. Price controls are suddenly being vigorously enforced at cattle auctions and at meatpackers and all retail locations. Ranchers will probably be promised some sort of rebate or tax deduction to keep them selling at these low prices so that there won't be a spike in retail beef prices before the elections in 2012. After that, however, the national herd will be in bad shape to supply the biggest beef eating country in the world and resume our traditional seat among the great beef exporters.

I have a pretty big herd down here; I'm thinking that I might actually get a fair price someday!

Welcome to FT, Yanqui Mike... ^

Yes.... many of the things that are currently wrong with Argentine Beef production have to do with this friggen' K regime...

Obviously, the reporters should have turned to FT for the real story. Thanks for the information.

Thanks, Gaucho.

As you might imagine, I'm not a tremendously big fan of La K halfway through her "first" term ...but I liked El K for the most part. Who I always liked was Duhalde ...the guy who stepped up to bat after howmany? presidents in one month, fixed the crisis, then handed power over to his successor. That guy never gets enough credit for that. They say he's not too fond of Los K, either.

I really don't mind measures like price-controls; they are good short-term measures and more governments should consider them. But the trouble is that short-term measures always seem to take on a life of their own ...then they become permanent ...then, what was a good idea originally starts to cause problems because it's lived out its usefulness.

Although I'm an immigrant, I consider myself an Argentine patriot. I came here to "hacer la Am�rica" in my own small way like millions before me. Are we growing too much soy here, as Cristina says? Yes. Should we do something about it? Yes. Did I take the best part of my pastures away from beef production to grow soy and other crops? Yes.

What happened was this: at the height of the "grain price bubble" the government said that it was bad for Argentina and that they were going to take steps against the "soy-ization" of the country. Not a bad idea.

What they actually did, however, was to impose a 35% tax on the export of soy. Also not a bad idea in itself, either, if you want to influence what farmers plant.

How they screwed it all up was: they imposed the tax in the middle of the harvest of all that soy ...at a time that it was bringing farmers the highest prices that they'd seen in ages.

That was seen as confiscatory ...and the government wasn't seen as trying to influence anyone ...but rather they were seen as horning in on one of the only big paydays that farmers had seen in years.

If you actually want to influence what farmers plant, you do it before planting ...in the spring, before they plant whatever it is they are thinking about planting. You could warn that if the farmers continue to plant too much of "whatever" ...you are going to take a huge chunk of their profits.

That's not what they did. They took a big chunk of the profits from the farmers' decision to plant something that nobody said was bad when they planted it... and told them that it was only to influence their future decisions.

Farmers got very angry at that. It caused a rural strike. The president handled it badly.

In my opinion, if they had allowed the farmers the profits from the previous year's decision to plant certain crops such as soy, then imposed a tremendous tax on decisions like that in the coming year ...there would have been no problem. As it happened, farmers blocked the roads and withheld their harvest from the market.

All the above happened on top of the same sort of measures to influence the beef producers here. There had already been "short-term" measures taken to "influence" beef producers. The credibility of all those measures just simply fell apart. Ranchers started to get out of the business in light of the continued pressures on agriculture in general.

The really bad part is that when cow-pasture is converted to crops ...it doesn't get converted back to cows.

My wife and I believe that good, grass-fed, Argentine beef will become profitable someday. That is why we are holding onto our herd when so very many of our neighbors are abandoning ranching (already, 40% of Argentine beef comes from feedlots ...like almost 100% in the US.) We've had the luxury, so far, of refusing to give up grass-fed beef production. Most of the people we know haven't; they've thrown in the towel.

I don't think that Los K want to go down in history as the administration that killed Argentina's preeminence among beef producing nations ...but when you are a politician under pressure, short-term political gain is hard to resist.

Love,
Mike
Buenos Aires

Well said Yanqui Mike. ^

Fancy running for Presidency?

Hee hee!

I already AM president en castellano!

Chairman (presidente) of Democrats Abroad Argentina. The US Democratic Party in Argentina.

Loved your post,
Mike
www.yanquimike.com.ar

Mike... as a cattle-man, I assume you are into red wine...?

YanquiMike,
Great website and very interesting youtube video of BAires. Thanks for posting.

Pls let us know when you are having una parillada at the ranch. You will be amazed at how many FTers can shoe up on a moment's notice.