Governor Maximiliano Pullaro, together with the ministers of Productive Development, Gustavo Puccini, and Economy, Pablo Olivares, presented Genera, a programme to finance energy infrastructure works of up to $ 300 million.
The plan seeks to strengthen infrastructure through a financing scheme with two lines, boosting industrial development and improving the stability of the provincial energy system. Some of the sectors targeted will be cold storage plants; metallurgical, dairy, meat, agri-food and manufacturing industries; mills; and industrial parks.
It should be noted that the two lines of financing will be private and public-private: in the first, the Province will finance 100% of the cost of the work, while the private party will return the investment in 36 months with 12 months grace period, having the first year of interest repayment with a fixed rate of 25%, after the first year repayment of capital plus interest with (BADLAR rate). The execution and contracting of the work will be the responsibility of the private party.
In the public-private line, the province finances 100% of the work, absorbs 30% of the total, while the private party will repay 70% in 36 months, with 12 months grace period, having the first-year interest repayment with a fixed rate of 25%, after the first-year repayment of capital plus interest with (BADLAR rate).
Betting on production
During the presentation at the Santa Fe Government House, Pullaro acknowledged that "the challenge we have in Santa Fe is to give all the tools to our private system so that it can grow, be competitive and generate jobs. For this reason, this year we have been very strong with credit policies, guarantees, with subsidised rates, betting fundamentally on sustaining our economic systems in each of the regions of the province".
And in relation to Genera, the governor stressed that "it has to do with a government programme that is very clear about where the province should go and what the way out is: it is to do what we know how to do", and in this sense he assured that "the people of Santa Fe know how to work and we know very well what we can produce. Nobody has to explain it to us because it is in our DNA, it is in our culture. We are working people in every town and in every city".
Also present during the event were the provisional president of the Senate, Felipe Michlig; the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Clara García; the secretary of Productive Infrastructure, Federico Carballeira; the operational coordinator of the Agency for Economic Cooperation and External Financing, Nicolás Aimar; the secretary of Coordination of Digital Transformation, Mauricio Basso; the senator for the Belgrano department, Pablo Verdecchia; and the provincial deputy, Dionisio Scarpín, among others.
One more tool
For the Minister of Productive Development, Gustavo Puccini, Genera "is a very important tool" and that is why he called to think "that behind a new machine that is going to be turned on, there may be a new job; it is a new ship that will perhaps put that company into operation, it will enable it to produce perhaps even new products".
In addition, the minister recalled that this is "one more of the tools we have been working on, making available, as were the tools of credit, innovation for the productive sector and also infrastructure".
The Minister of Economy, Pablo Olivares, considered that with the launch of Genera, "we are taking a step forward based on the efficiencies we have been able to make during this year to be able to finance from the State and make two things available in instruments: the instruments and the financing so that the private sector, on its own but with financing provided by the State to amortise under very favourable conditions, can carry out this infrastructure on its own so that the Provincial Energy Company can then provide the service with the power it needs. Or the State in a public-private way where at the same time the State executes this work with the requirements established by the EPE and it is co-financed by the industry, which will not have to disburse this co-financing, but this co-financing will be footwear with a line of loan that will be given by the Investment and Development Fund".
