Almost 80,000 people took advantage of the May 1 holiday to cross to the neighboring country and do their weekly shopping.
Motivated by the exchange difference, thousands of Uruguayans took advantage of the long weekend due to the Labor Day holiday to make a getaway to the Argentina for tourist purposes, or directly to do the weekly shopping.
Throughout the weekend, supermarkets in Concord and Gualeguaychu (Between rivers) saw how a flood of Orientals swept away the products in the supermarket gondolas, motivated by much cheaper prices in dollars.
The National Directorate of Migration (DNM) reported that between Friday and Sunday, nails 79,277 people left Uruguay bound for Argentina. According to the records, most people chose to cross the Libertador General San Martín Bridge, which connects the city of Fray Bentos with the area of Puerto Unzué, close to Gualeguaychú.
The average purchasing power of Uruguayans as a result of the exchange difference is 4 to 1which has allowed Concordia supermarkets to see scenes of people taking the full box of a product, or large amounts of basic products such as noodles and flour.
Uruguayans cross into Argentina to do the weekly shopping
During their visit, the Uruguayans have chosen to stock up basically on food and drinks, and they manage to spend a little more than 5 kilos allowed by law. In turn, they take advantage of loading fuel, since gasoline is “given away” with differences of up to more than 1.5 dollars per liter.
The large number of oriental has caused some shortages in the gondolas of Argentine supermarketssince due to the great flow of people, the employees do not always cope with replenishing the merchandise at the same rate as the demand.
According to the Border Price Indicator of the Economic Observatory of the Catholic University of Saltosome products in the hygiene basket are found in a 329% cheaper on the Argentine side, which is why there are also large queues of Uruguayans outside the pharmacy chains.
Source: Ambito
