LyrArc Article Gist
Argentina's government of president Alberto Fernandes is making a state takeover of Vicentin, a soyabean exporter which filed for bankruptcy in 2019 and is in ongoing court proceedings. Mr. Fernandes says he is doing this to rescue the century old agricultural firm to protect Vicentin workers, and 2600 farmers who sell crops to the company. Vicentin is Argentina's top exporter of soy meal and soy cooking oil. Mr. Fernandez says the company is a very important asset for the entire Argentine economy. Argentina's farm exports are its main source of earnings in dollars. 

A drought in Argentina's farm sector in April 2018 led to a drop in export revenues and worsened Argentina's financial position leading to the 2020 default on Argentine debt. In 2018 the farm sector lost a third of its crop value and 1.5% of GDP. Growth in 2017 was 3% but declined to 1% in 2018. A number of other factors including overborrowing using dollar denominated debt led to the economic crisis in 2020 right in the middle of the pandemic in May 2020. Fernandez is a moderate compared to the previous Kirchner administrations and was elected in 2019 to get Argentina out of the debt crisis after confidence in president Mauricio Macri declined. Fernandez has tackled the coronavirus crisis with an early lockdown compared to neighboring Brazil which has not taken decisive action making Brazil the second largest after the U.S. in cases. This gives Argentina some room to tackle the debt crisis and negotiations with the IMF, lenders.