Pánfilo Ayala, president of the Laguna Naineck branch of the Argentine Agrarian Federation, criticised the national Government's decision to open imports of certain foodstuffs, including bananas. He argued that this move legalises the damage to local banana production, which has always been free.

Presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni stated that the decision to open imports of certain products definitively aims to make prices more competitive through some tax reductions. The list includes 40 items: food and beverages, hygiene and care products, cleaning products, and medicines.

Ayala warned that the measure would further harm local banana production, which spans 5,000 hectares in northern Argentina and supports 5,000 families of small and medium-sized farmers producing approximately 150,000 tons of bananas annually. According to Ayala, the unlimited import of bananas has been maintained since the late '80s, resulting in a significant reduction in production due to "unfair competition". He lamented that the different governments allowed the importation of the total volume of domestic consumption, which is a little more than 500,000 tons per year, without considering local production. The Agrarian Federation calls for differentiated and protectionist public policies for local production, regulation of foreign banana imports during local harvest time, importing only what is needed, and a minimum reference price for local bananas in line with supply. Meanwhile, Secretary of Commerce Pablo Lavigne argued in a meeting with the head of the Coordinadora de Industrias de Productos Alimenticios (Copal), Daniel Funes de Rioja, and a group of executives, that the measure is necessary to lower prices that were expensive compared to dollar prices.