As Clarin announced yesterday, The government has decided to once again extend the entry into force of the new system of marketing meat in pieces up to 32 kilos, which was scheduled for tomorrow. Faced with pressure from a refrigerator sector and provinces that oppose the implementation of the new system, the Ministry of Agriculture has indicated that it will postpone the start of the compulsory quartering until mid-January 2023.

“In response to the requests submitted by the provinces regarding the need to strengthen matters relating to implementation, control and logistics, the Secretary of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries of the Nation has decided to extend, in an extraordinary way, for 75 days the implementation of resolution 2/21, referring to the cutting of meat “, indicated by the portfolio in a note.

And they added: “In this way the deadline is extended until January 15, 2023 so that the provinces and the actors that make up the supply chain finish adjusting what is necessary to start with the implementation of this measure recommended by the International Labor Organization, which it improves the working conditions of workers, so that they no longer carry half-carcasses weighing more than 100 kilos on their shoulders.

An important part of the slaughterhouses and consumer slaughterhouses had announced that from today they would not receive goods to be slaughtered to ask for the review of the provision, and that tomorrow they would start an indefinite suspension of activities, but before the government deviation they decided to suspend that measure of force And today at 3 pm they will be received by the National Director of Agricultural Trade Control Luciano Zarich.

Inside the chain there conflicting positions from a logistical, economic and health point of view. The new system, which was originally scheduled to go into operation at the beginning of this year, is mainly promoted by exporting refrigerators, who say that in addition to being beneficial for the health of operators, it generates the possibility of segment the market in a more virtuous way, sending the most precious cuts to the neighborhoods with the highest purchasing power and the economic cuts to the popular neighborhoods.

But from various slaughterhouses and refrigerators oriented to local consumption, and especially from the provinces, they say that adaptation to the new regime is too expensive for the shops medium or small and that adequate financing instruments have not been adopted. They also guarantee the protection of the health of the operators by incorporating mechanical means for the transfer of the half-carcasses from the trucks to the butchers.

We will have to wait until this afternoon to have new definitions on the form of distribution and marketing of meat in Argentina.