The Chimagro SA herbicide plant in Florencio Varela has been halted by its 44 workers, who denounce salaries paid in installments, unpaid contributions and asset stripping. Surcos, which is in reorganization proceedings, obtained an extension until April 8, 2027 to negotiate a debt of more than 70 million dollars.
The Chimagro SA herbicide plant, located in Florencio Varela (Buenos Aires) and owned by Grupo Surcos, has been halted by a decision of its 44 workers, who denounce salaries paid in installments, missing contributions and asset-stripping maneuvers. With no administrative or human resources staff and with dialogue cut off, the operators say they are alone inside the plant waiting for answers.
Surcos' crisis has been dragging on for two years. Since late 2024, the agricultural inputs company has suffered a sharp drop in sales and liquidity problems when a USD 500,000 obligation left it in default, and so far it has bought time in the courts to negotiate its debts. Activity fell sharply and sent a shockwave through its manufacturing plants, with a conflict that intensified in the Santa Fe town of Recreo, where insecticide production is concentrated.
Devoted mainly to herbicide production, much of which is shipped to Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia, Chimagro has always been a key leg of Grupo Surcos' operation. "We had been working very well until November 2024. We had shifts through Sundays and holidays, and overnight it all stopped," said Mariano Ayunta, delegate at the plant in the south of Greater Buenos Aires.
The situation has deepened recently: for four months they have been paid their salary in installments and the last annual bonus was split into six payments. The decision to halt activity was taken because in the past two weeks they stopped hearing from the company. "We had a promise that we would be paid, but nothing," Ayunta said.
Until a few days ago, they were working two to three days a week, with output of between 20,000 and 30,000 liters of product per day. "When they paid, we worked. But since last week we have been paralyzed because the backlog is too big and there is no intention to pay," explained the delegate, who also denounces that for months no contributions have been made to the health plan, the union or the pension fund, even though they are deducted from pay slips.
The Santa Fe courts granted a new 90-business-day extension for Surcos to negotiate its reorganization debts of more than 70 million dollars. The deadline will now be April 8, 2027. "With the extensions they obtain they keep dragging things out and, meanwhile, they speculate with us. We are the ones being punished," they say in Florencio Varela.
The company had already negotiated a suspension with the operators some time ago due to lack of work. "We accepted with the promise that everything would be fixed. And, on the contrary, it started getting worse," they explain. Strictly speaking, the company is not bankrupt and remains operational, albeit with a sharp drop in its revenue.
At successive hearings before the provincial Ministry of Labor, where emissaries of the Personal de Industrias Químicas y Petroquímicas (SPIQyP) union of Avellaneda take part, the talk now is of moving ahead with voluntary buyouts. What is on offer is 50% of the compensation in a minimum of 10 installments. It is a process the 44 workers view with concern, many of whom — more than half, they estimate — have at least 30 years of service at the plant.
In Chimagro's corridors they doubt the goal is to close the plant, because it is a key leg of production, but they perceive that the stance toward the workers has a particular purpose. "They want to strip us of benefits and collective strength. They want to pressure people into leaving for as little money as possible and keep operating," Ayunta said. The operators sit down to negotiate with an outside adviser who, they say, "offered 'irresistible deals' and did not even know that in this sector people are paid every two weeks."
"The company has been cutting off dialogue little by little and there are no human resources or administrative staff left. There is no one left; we talk on WhatsApp and they don't tell us what is going to happen," the delegate added. Faced with the uncertainty, the decision was to stay at the plant to block any possibility of asset stripping, an allegation that raised the temperature of the conflict over one specific incident. "We found out they had been threatening the truck drivers to come pick up the raw material at night, when there is no one at the plant, so they can take away what little is left," he said.
The workers in Recreo denounced the same, where voluntary buyouts are also moving forward and, in recent days, they pushed new protest measures. With no other channel for dialogue than the provincial hearings, where there has been no certainty so far, Chimagro's workers keep going every day to the plant in the south of Buenos Aires province, waiting for Surcos to regularize payments and, therefore, activity. Until then, they warned, the machinery will remain halted. "So far we have tried to resolve this in the best way, always shouldering the burden ourselves, but the company gives no sign that there is a way out. Far from talking, they want to take away what little there is and so far we see no intention of solving anything," they said.
