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24-10-2023
Toll on the waterway: users denounce “inefficiency” in the works and insist that its collection is illegal
The Permanent Transportation Commission of the La Plata Basin (CPTCP), made up of users of the waterway from the five countries that use it, asked to participate in the meetings in which an attempt is being made to put an end to the controversies.
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The Permanent Transportation Commission of the La Plata Basin (CPTCP), an entity made up of the users of the navigable waterway from the five signatory countries of the “Santa Cruz de la Sierra” Agreement (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay), claimed to be able to participate in the discussions regarding the collection of a toll on the waterway.
It is worth remembering that, recently, there was a strong controversy between Argentina and Paraguay for this reason, which was on the verge of escalating to a judicial presentation, after the General Administration of Ports (AGP) retained a Paraguayan barge convoy because supposedly there was no paid the toll in question, which the neighboring country considers illegal.
In any case, after several instances of back and forth in this conflict, a sphere of negotiations was finally opened, which is where the CPTCP asks to be an active part, especially to define the works that are necessary in the northern section of the waterway; that is, in what is called “Puerto de Santa Fe – Confluencia”.
THE CONTROVERSY OVER THE TOLL ON THE WATERWAY
According to the CPTCP, “the recent technical discussions between the five member countries of the Agreement, related to the conflict derived from the unilateral implementation of a toll in the upper section of the Waterway, imply losing an opportunity to address technical issues essential for the safety of the navigation in the area.”
In this framework, on October 17, the First Meeting of Experts attended by the Intergovernmental Committee of the Paraguay-Paraná Waterway (CIH) took place in Montevideo (Uruguay), where the AGP, current concessionaire of the Trunk Navigation Route, held , among other topics, a presentation on the beacon service provided in the aforementioned section.
The CPTCP said that it requested to participate in this meeting, but the request was not granted, and added: "We consider it essential that users of the navigable canal have the possibility of participating in such events, especially given the ineffectiveness of the works carried out on the section in "This issue is the result of the process of extending the concession contract for the southern sector of the Trunk Navigable Route (from kilometer 460 towards the sea)."
For the Permanent Commission, “both the river and navigation have completely different characteristics in both sections and it has not been possible to find a design of works and services that account for these differences and achieve the result of facilitating navigation.”
“The participation of users and experts in the river will make it possible to identify obstacles to navigation and create the technical instance and design technological solutions, according to current times,” continued the CPTCP.
MORE MEETINGS ON THE WATERWAY
The next meeting of the Intergovernmental Waterway Committee is scheduled for October 31 in Buenos Aires, and the CPTCP announced that it will once again request the possibility of participating in it and thus contribute its knowledge, acquired in many years of navigation.
In this context, he also recalled his position that the toll that is being debated has no technical or legal basis to be applied.
The controversy began when, at the beginning of the year, the Argentine government proceeded to implement the collection of a toll of 1.47 dollars per ton of net registration for cabotage transportation that circulates through the “Puerto de Santa Fe-Confluencia” section of the Waterway.
Then, last June, a meeting of the Paraguay-Paraná Waterway Agreement Commission was held in Buenos Aires and the representatives of Paraguay, Bolivia, Brazil and Uruguay, based on the technical documentation presented by the CPTCP, determined that, in Based on the information presented by the Argentine delegation, “there is no basis for charging a toll in the Puerto de Santa Fe-Confluencia section because the hydromorphological conditions of the river in that sector allow the safe navigation of vessels at a 10-foot draft. , 24 hours a day, without the need for dredging interventions.”
Furthermore, "because the beacon service responds to a channel design that does not correspond to the natural channels that mark the middle Paraná and limit the navigation conditions of the convoys, in that segment."
For this reason, the CPTCP concluded: “We reiterate our position regarding compliance with the provisions of the Santa Cruz de la Sierra Agreement, which establishes that goods transported in international customs transit are not subject to the payment of taxes to the import or export, with the exception of the payment of fees for services actually provided, something that is evidently not met in the case of the toll of 1.47 dollars per ton of net registration that Argentina is trying to impose."