Argentine News

A vessel carrying wheat that ran aground near the main channel of South America's Parana River has been freed but the waterway remains closed while checks are being made, the Argentine Naval Prefecture said on Tuesday.The vessel ran aground on Feb.17 and "was heading outbound in laden condition, navigating with a draft of 10.23 meters and carrying 31,121 metric tons of wheat," Inchcape Shipping said in a notice.The Parana River runs through Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina.

Brazil, Paraguay, Bolivia and Uruguay have urged Argentina to stop applying tolls for ships and barges carrying grains and other exports, saying it restricts navigation on a key river channel.The four countries issued a joint statement late on Sunday blasting as "unilateral and arbitrary" Argentina's decision to seize a barge from Mercurio Group, a Paraguayan shipping company, to collect a toll, adding its actions could affect supply and prices.The barge was released on Monday after paying the toll, a company spokesperson told local radio.Argentine authorities say tolls on the Paraguay-Parana

A tanker containing liquefied natural gas (LNG) that originated from a Russia supplier and was loaded onto a Gunvor Group-chartered vessel off the coast of France was turned away this week by Argentine energy firm Enarsa, according to officials.The tanker Flex Artemis was in the South Atlantic and heading northeast on Thursday, according to Refinitiv vessel tracking. It had carried LNG from Yamal in Russia, according to a trader familiar with the matter, and had arrived in Argentine waters about July 14.The rejection is one more sign of the energy market upheavals since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year and of a growing wariness of buyers involving even authorized deals with Russia-originated fuels.

Four times the tonnage of the original Open Arms rescue tugboat and with a capacity to carry up to 1,000 people, the Open Arms Uno made its first rescue on Wednesday, picking up 101 migrants stranded on a wooden boat off the Tunisian coast."Sit down, if you don't sit down we don't continue," a crew member shouted to the excited migrants from a speed boat launched from the vessel operated by the Spanish charity Open Arms before all were taken aboard.One had jumped into the water to try to reach the speed boat…

Argentine ship workers will stage a 24-hour strike on Thursday to protest what they call delays by the government in awarding tenders to the sector, although the action is not expected to affect activity at key grains ports in and around Rosario.The Maritime, Port and Naval Industry Federation (Fempinra) announced the strike on Tuesday, less than a week after protests by grains truck drivers snarled up transportation of soy and corn right in the middle of the harvest season.Worker protests have grown more common in the South American country, the world's top exporter of processed soy and no.

Jan De Nul Group’s new water injection dredger Pancho was launched at the Neptune Marine shipyard near Dordrecht in the Netherlands. The dredger will be used mainly in the Argentine dredging market, but will be available for projects elsewhere as well.The design of this newbuild vessel is based on an existing vessel design from Neptune’s workboat portfolio. Together with the engineering department of Neptune, Jan De Nul integrates its in-house built dredging equipment, including the dredge pump and dredge pipes…

Gustavo Alcides Diaz, an Argentine fisherman and hunter from a river island community, is at home on the water. The Parana River once lapped the banks near his wooden stilt home that he could reach by boat. Fish gave him food and income. He purified river water to drink.Now the 40-year-old looks out on a trickle of muddy water.The Parana, South America's second-largest river behind only the Amazon, has retreated this year to its lowest level since its record low in 1944, hit by cyclical droughts and dwindling rainfall upriver in Brazil.

Ships leaving the Argentine agricultural ports hub of Rosario on the Parana River are having to reduce cargos by thousands of tonnes due to low water levels, the local head of logistics said on Wednesday, amid growing environmental concerns.Dryness in Brazil, where the Parana originates, has diminished cargo traffic and sparked worries by environmentalists about dredging the river below certain depths. The dryness has reduced the amount of cargo that can be carried by ships at the height of the Argentine corn and soy export season."Handymax ships are leaving port with 9…

Ships leaving the Argentine agricultural ports hub of Rosario on the Parana River are having to reduce cargos by thousands of tonnes due to low water levels, the local head of logistics said on Wednesday, amid growing environmental concerns.Dryness in Brazil, where the Parana originates, has diminished cargo traffic and sparked worries by environmentalists about dredging the river below certain depths. The dryness has reduced the amount of cargo that can be carried by ships at the height of the Argentine corn and soy export season."Handymax ships are leaving port with 9…

The government of Santa Fe province in Argentina late on Wednesday ordered port workers to suspend a day-old strike that had blocked grains shipments at the country's main agricultural export hub and mandated wage negotiations be resumed.Protests by port construction workers in Argentina's key grains hub Rosario had snarled exports, with roads blocked at some of the area's key export terminals, an industry official told Reuters earlier on Wednesday.The protest began late on Tuesday and on Wednesday spread to the districts of Puerto General San Martin and Timbues…

A coalition of nine Argentine port worker unions will go on a nationwide 24-hour strike starting at midnight to press for vaccinations against the coronavirus, the labor groups said in a statement on Thursday.Workers including tugboat captains and customs officers have held similar work stoppages recently, as the South American grains powerhouse gets hit by a second wave of COVID-19 cases."We have raised the issue and held meetings with different authorities with the purpose to obtaining concrete answers regarding the application of vaccines against COVID-19 to our workers…

Excelerate Energy’s floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU) the Exemplar has begun operations in Bahia Blanca, a port city located 400 miles south of the Argentine capital Buenos Aires.The Exemplar, with a storage capacity of 150,900 m3, will deliver liquefied natural gas (LNG) for the 2021 winter season in Argentina, providing reliability and stability to the country’s energy system despite operating in the challenging conditions of the South Atlantic.“We are excited…

Argentine port workers said on Tuesday they would hold a 48-hour strike starting at midnight (0300 GMT Wednesday), after paralyzing agricultural exports from the country last week with an initial work stoppage over demands they be vaccinated against COVID-19.Cargo traffic at the ports hub of Rosario, from which about 80% of the country's grains exports are shipped, was snarled by last week's strike by tugboat captains and other maritime port workers. A group of 11 unions issued a statement late on Tuesday announcing the new work stoppage.They are asking to be designated as essential workers…

Seven grains ships stranded at Argentina's export hub of Rosario will be towed free and sent out to sea after they were loaded with more produce than could be carried on the port's increasingly shallow waters, local authorities said on Friday.Rosario traffic has been snarled in the aftermath of a 48-hour strike by tugboat captains and other workers managing the flow of agricultural cargo ships.Seven ships, six of them large Panamax vessels, loaded with soymeal, corn and other farm products were moored at Rosario during the work stoppage.

Argentina's main grains port of Rosario was snarled on Friday in the aftermath of a 48-hour strike by tugboat captains and other workers managing the flow of agricultural cargo ships, who are demanding access to COVID-19 vaccines, port authorities said.Seven ships—six of them large Panamax vessels—that had been loaded with soy and other farm products were stranded at their docks, unable to embark due to the falling water level of the Parana River at Rosario, according to a letter…

Argentina's grains exports remained paralyzed on Thursday due to a strike by port workers demanding to be vaccinated against COVID-19, with the labor groups threatening another 48-hour work stoppage next week.Argentina's Port and Maritime Activities chamber told Reuters the strike on Wednesday and Thursday had halted port activity. Industry leaders agree port workers should be protected from COVID-19, but Argentina's vaccination program has had a slow roll-out.After a meeting with government officials late on Wednesday…

Argentina's Parana River, the grains superhighway that takes soy and corn from the Pampas farm belt to the world, has gotten so shallow that it has started "trimming" international shipments just as the country's export season gets underway.The level of the Parana at the export hub of Rosario, home to some of the biggest soy crushing plants in the world, was a scant 0.90 meters on Wednesday, according to the Coast Guard.Between 1996 and 2020 the median depth of the river at Rosario in April was a much deeper 3.58 meters.

The union representing Argentine port-side grain inspectors said on Thursday it had ended a month-long wage strike after reaching a contract deal with export companies that will allow international soy, corn and wheat shipments to return to normal.The deal was struck after a marathon negotiation session with Argentina's private ports chamber on Wednesday. The work stoppage by the union, known by its Spanish acronym Urgara, started on Dec. 9 and had hit operations in key ports throughout Argentina…

More than 100 cargo ships were kept from loading agricultural goods in Argentina on Monday, as a wage strike by grains inspectors and oilseed workers stretched into its second week, paralyzing exports from one of the world's breadbaskets.Argentina is the No. 1 international exporter of soymeal livestock feed used to fatten hogs and poultry from Europe to Southeast Asia. Contract talks between workers and export companies have broken down over compensation packages, with both sides…

Loading of more than 140 agricultural export ships in Argentina has been stalled by a port-side oilseed workers' strike that started on Dec. 9, the head of the local chamber of soymeal manufacturers said on Monday, on the eve of talks on a new contract.The CIARA-CEC chamber of soy byproduct manufacturers will meet on Tuesday with the two main unions representing oilseed workers to try and hammer out a 2021 compensation package."We seek an agreement with the unions that allows the efficient…

Argentine oilseed workers and grains inspectors said on Wednesday they will spend Christmas on strike, further bogging down agricultural exports by extending a work stoppage that started on Dec. 9.The latest offer from the CIARA-CEC chamber of soyoil manufacturers and exporters was issued late on Tuesday. It was rejected by the SOEA union of oilseed workers and the Argentine federation of oilseed workers."We and our families will spend Christmas on strike," said the two unions…

Argentina's influential chamber of soyoil manufacturers and exporters on Sunday spiced up an offer to striking workers, seeking to end a more than two-week standoff that has bogged down exports from one of the world's main breadbaskets.The CIARA-CEC chamber said it would top up salaries by 35% in 2020, a central demand of the striking workers, many of whom stayed on the job through the height of the coronavirus pandemic. The group also offered a 70,000 peso (about $840) bonus…

Argentine grain port workers launched surprise strikes to protest stalled wage talks, their labor union said on Monday, delaying shipments from one of the world's top exporters."We are going to make surprise halts as much as we consider it necessary," said Juan Carlos Peralta, a spokesman for the URGARA union, which represents inspectors who check the quality of grains before they are loaded onto ships."It is a strike in one of the richest sectors in Argentina. We have exhausted…