Evo Goes to Hurlingham

Bolivian Pres. Evo Morales (r.) with Hurlingham Mayor Luis Acuña

Offered the opportunity to attend a press conference with Evo Morales last week, when he was in Buenos Aires to sign an agreement with Argentine Pres. Nestor Kirchner to raise the price Argentina pays Bolivia for gas by 47%, from $3.40 to $5 per million BTUs, I took it. The press conference in Hurlingham was the usual hurry-up-and-wait, 90 minutes of sitting around with crabby, chain-smoking camera men followed by 13 minutes of Q&A made up largely of Morales speaking without saying anything.

But the occasion of the price-raise making for interesting economics: To make sure consumers and businesses don't have to pay more inside Argentina, it appears likely that Argentina will subsidize gas prices in country and raise the export taxes charged on sales to Chile (because, well, the Argentina/Chile relationship is like that). But as this article--and many others--have noted, Argentina is suffering a lack of foreign investment in the energy sector and therefore an increasingly worrisome shortage of gas. This, of course, leads to the next question: can Argentina find a way to increase investment in the energy sector to wean its need for foreign hydrocarbons (making it again totally self-supplied) without crushing local citizens and busineses?

And, more importantly, where does Evo buy his rad coats?