Argentine government pulls chapter on land sales to foreigners from Senate debate

Argentina's ruling coalition dropped the rural land chapter from the Inviolability of Private Property bill from the Senate's agenda on Wednesday, lacking the necessary votes to pass it just hours before a Thursday session. A spokesman for the La Libertad Avanza bloc and its allies confirmed the unanimous decision, stating it was made to build broader consensus and not to permanently remove the chapter.

Other outlets report the chapter was dropped, suggesting it would require a new bill from the executive to be revived. The decision came after several governors indicated their senators would vote against the chapter. The bill, originally submitted on March 27 with 53 articles, had been attempted four times. A protest is planned for Thursday outside Congress, calling for "The homeland is not for sale."

A poll released on July 28 showed 77% support for limiting land purchases by foreigners. The current law, passed in 2011, restricts foreigners to holding more than 15% of rural land at three levels: national, provincial, and municipal, with a maximum of 1,000 hectares for any single foreign holder in the core farming region. The original bill removed the cap, but the government initially offered to raise it to 25%, which would have applied the limit only by province, removing the national and municipal levels.

This modification is significant as the operative constraint was never at larger scales. According to the National Registry of Rural Land, no province comes close to the cap, while several departments exceed it substantially. The Land Observatory estimates 13.2 million hectares are in foreign hands, close to 5% of the national territory, comparable to the size of Greece or Nicaragua.