In the middle of the declaration of national road emergency on the part of the government, the rice sector He insists on an improvement and assures that it is a temporary measure to address the problems that plague this area of the country’s agriculture.
After the declaration of the national road emergencyafter the request of Congress of Mayors to the Office of Planning and Budget (OPP) due to the deteriorated state of rural roads after the extreme weather events that the country has experienced with the beginning of autumn, the Executive power determined an amount of 15 million extra dollars to repair damaged rural roads.
Faced with this, the president of the Rice Growers Association (HERE), Alfredo Lago, admitted that it was a necessary measure but it is temporary. “At ACA we have been proposing to increase the level of construction that this road has because it is at the expense of situations that can strongly compromise production outputs,” Lago explained to Radio Montecarlo, referring to the extreme weather events that complicated the roads.
“This is a temporary and specific measure that will meet that need. We insist that a structure of another level must be generated to be better prepared for inclement weather,” he added.
Interference in elections
Regarding this, Lago will begin conversations with different companies starting this Monday. presidential candidates to tell them that they have been demanding an improvement since 2019, in which no progress was made. “A five-year government passed and nothing was done about it. Without a doubt we are a relegated sector in that type of things,” he claimed.
“To develop the country and looking at it from the inside, improvement in roads is necessary. We must keep in mind that our function has to reach Montevideo and the port,” he explained.
Government help
The objective behind the government’s decision was, precisely, to enable extraordinary resources from the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF) to guarantee the entry and exit of trucks loaded with grain once the season begins soy harvest and, thus, guarantee one of the most important crops for the country’s trade balance.
“What we are looking for with this, about 15 million extra dollars, is to be able to repair the roads and so that the soybean harvest can be delivered in a timely manner,” explained the undersecretary of Transportation and Public Works (MTOP), Juan José Olaizola to El País, and added that “work is already being done in some departments of the coast”.
The urgency is greater if we take into account the important floods that suffers the south of Brazil and that, at the local level, can impact a significant flood of the Uruguay River which, eventually, generates a worsening of the road situation that is already in a delicate state at a general level throughout the country.
Likewise, Olaizola highlighted that there was “a very significant increase in production in recent decades,” so the next government “must think about assuming a different attitude towards rural roads, without transferring all responsibility to the departmental municipalities.” “This must be negotiated at the time, but it is an idea that we have in the Ministry of Transportation,” added the nationalist leader.
Source: Ambito
