Chihuahua, Chih.- Former left-wing federal deputy and agricultural activist, Heraclio “Yako” Rodríguez, pointed out that Claudia Sheinbaum’s representative, virtual president of the Republic, before the Mexican business community, Altagracia Gómez, has a notable conflict of interest in occupying the position and that, in addition, she will seek to end the internal market for yellow corn.
Rodríguez Gómez, a federal deputy for the Labor Party from 2018 to 2021, also described as serious the statements made by Julio Berdegué Sacristán, the next Secretary of Agriculture in Claudia Sheinbaum’s administration, regarding abandoning self-sufficiency in yellow corn in Mexico.
“The appointment of the Secretary of Agriculture is serious, because in principle he is a person who does not know the country, and he comes to take yellow corn off the market, but we also have the appointment of Altagracia Gómez, the owner of Minsa,” said the politician and activist.
For Yako, the logic is simple: Altagracia Gómez, being one of the corn flour processing consortia, will promote massive purchases from the cheaper US market due to the subsidies and support applied by the neighboring government to its producers, ending local production, that is, buying at a lower price without caring about the domestic market.
He clarified that Mexican yellow corn is not transgenic, but rather a mixture of varieties that result in a product that currently supplies at least 530 sectors of the economy, from atoles and foods that use corn starch, oils, flakes such as Corn Flakes, food for birds, livestock…
“I think it was a mistake by the next secretary to make such a hasty statement on the subject of abandoning the production of yellow corn in Mexico because when it comes to importing we cannot counterbalance it and the price of corn could skyrocket to 12 pesos, and with that the price of eggs, milk, meat and many other products could skyrocket as well. This would take Chihuahua out of production and generate an uncontrollable inflationary spiral,” warned the farmer from Chihuahua.
He indicated that Chihuahua produces 1.8 million tons of yellow corn per year, which would require 36 thousand trips of 50-ton trailers just to be marketed, meaning that the transportation logistics alone generates an expenditure of 1.8 billion pesos, in addition to the value of the corn.
“It is a neoliberal policy, which sells out the Mexican market to the United States. We have 30 million Mexicans as an internal market, which we are handing over to the United States. The government would be failing to comply with a constitutional mandate and with the Law on Sustainable Rural Development,” he insisted.
He stressed that Chihuahua is the number one producer of yellow corn in Mexico and announced that they will defend their right to production through legal elements from the Sustainable Rural Development Councils of the municipalities and state governments, in addition to mobilizations of the National Front for the Rescue of the Mexican Countryside.
“They want to hand over to the United States
United, the market that we have built from Chihuahua and other states, we are going to try to reverse this announced policy because it is unrealistic and based only on ideology, the Morena government must support us and not harm us. Well, what is it about! “, he concluded.
“The issue of the appointment of the Secretary of Agriculture is serious, because in principle he is a person who does not know the country, and he comes to take yellow corn off the market,” said Heraclio ‘Yako’ Rodríguez, former federal deputy and activist.
#bankrupt #Chihuahua #farmers
