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The United States is studying a prohibition on imports of Argentine beef, blamed on the debt
El Diario Exterior (Spain)
August 25, 2008

Although it's spoken in terms of avoiding hoof-and-mouth disease, it's clear that the many Senators of the U.S. government will push in the coming days a bill that will ban the importation of Argentine beef into the US market. The initiative was first pushed by a powerful group of creditors of the Argentine government.

by Luciana Binaghi

Under the banner of avoiding "the danger of hoof-and-mouth disease contamination", on July 9th the US Senate received a bill that bans the importation of beef or pork, fresh or frozen, from Argentina.

While the ban itself would be new, there is already a trade "track record" from the U.S. that is rife with barriers and restrictions for Argentine products and more when dealing with beef exports, notable in that it comes with a heavy political burden.

Republican Senators (sic) Tim Johnson and Michael Enzi back up their bill with many arguments which center more on the debt that Argentina has with that country, than the problem of hoof-and-mouth disease.

In fact the bill is pushed by the powerful U.S. Cattlemen's Association (USCA), that in turn is part of the American Task Force Argentina (ATFA), which is made up of creditors that fell outside the restructuring of Argentine debt and that, until now, are demanding that the government return their money.

One day after the introduction in Congress, ATFA thanked the efforts of the USCA for "introducing legislation that points out the terrible history of Argentina."

Some paragraphs down, the release points out the importance of the bill (called "Keeping America Hoof-and-Mouth Free") and says that ATFA will continue "pressuring the U.S. government to assist U.S. citizens that should recover their billions of dollars they lent to the Argentine government and that now they refuse to give back."

Since July 17th, the ban on meat into the US market has been in the House of Representatives. All the time there are more possibilities that it will have a positive response from a majority of Senators, above all if they take into account that the legislators that back it are from cattle states (Colorado, Wyoming, and New Mexico) what would have a high participation in the presidential election in November.

In AFTA there are farming associations from almost every state, along with teachers pension funds that, according to their website, "lost more than 100 million dollars" as a consequence of the Argentine default.