Adriana Santagati
05/10/2020 - 16:20
- Clarín.com
- Cities
In the new scheme with which the City will go through the quarantine due to the coronavirus starting next week, the Buenos Aires Government enabled that as of Tuesday, the gastronomic establishments can also operate using the take away modality . However, the entities of the sector warned that this measure is a palliative that will have a relative effect and demanded responses from the national and local State for now, but also for after the pandemic.
The plan that the head of government, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, made official this Saturday, allows that from Tuesday restaurants, bars, breweries, ice cream parlors and other gastronomic venues can open from 11 and until its closure , without time limits, and also sell in the "take away" mode, which is added to the delivery that was already authorized. The salons will continue to be closed.
The business chambers celebrate that this form of marketing is also allowed, but admit that it will move little the needle of a turnover that continues on the floor. Ariel Amoroso, president of the Association of Hotels, Restaurants, Confectioneries and Cafes (AHRCC), estimated that delivery usually represents 10% of the turnover of the premises. Graciela Fresno, head of the Gastronomic Hotel Business Federation of the Argentine Republic (FEHGRA), calculated it at around 15%. Both agreed that those numbers are those that were managed before the pandemic, and that the quarantine did not increase them because people withdrew their expenses . “It is what you will spend the least on. You shop at the supermarket and cook at home, "said Fresno.
Gabriel Famá, president of the Association of Artisan and Related Ice Cream Manufacturers (AFADHYA), rescued that for this item "it is an aid to lower the costs of delivery apps that are killing us ." As he pointed out, the minimum average that they charge to ice cream parlors (and to pizzerias and other premises) is 20%, with a floor of 17% to those that have many branches, but that "in some loose neighborhood ice cream parlor they charge 35%, a third of the gross value . Excluding VAT and fixed costs, the ice cream maker has nothing left. ”
In the case of FEHGRA, being a national entity, they look at the porteño photo but also the panoramic view of the entire country, where there are districts that are gradually opening gastronomic activity or will do so soon. For this reason, they developed a protocol together with FUNCEI - the foundation created by the infectologist Daniel Stamboulian - to give their associates a guide with sanitary guidelines both in food handling, preparation and delivery to the client (either delivery or take away ), but also thinking about reopening, with the distance that must be between the tables and the guidelines to serve customers.
Fresno points out a common concern: how the consumer will behave when the restrictions are lifted. “What is said or is being published realizes that people may be reluctant when there is still no vaccine, they may be afraid to go to this or that place. That is why we want to give you the peace of mind that at that moment, we are going to guarantee all the security measures in your care , scientifically guaranteed ”.
“Restaurants and bars live on what we sell in the living room. We are concerned about the now and when we reopen, about the number of people we are going to have. Due to social separation, the capacity is going to be much smaller than it currently is, and with that capacity we were just right, ”said Amoroso, who remarked that the majority of bars and restaurants are SMEs that do not have a financial back. In the City, he counted, there are 8,000 gastronomic establishments that employ 60,000 people . At the national level, Fresno estimated that out of this calculation made of 2 million unemployed gastronomic workers throughout the country, those who were able to return to work with these exceptions are a much lower percentage.
The business chambers are grateful for the contributions of the ANSES ATP program, which pays 50% of salaries, but point out that the measure is insufficient because the current billing of the ventures does not cover the costs and also because these businesses are going to be the last to open normally. "We have asked that the tax maturities not run within the pandemic period and that the AFIP payment plans not fall because people do not have income to pay the fees, and we have not obtained it. We continue to insist on this and anticipate that the sector will need assistance through very soft loans to reactivate itself, because it also depends on tourism, which will not be around for long, "Fresno summarized.
Amoroso added that they are in negotiations with the ENRE to recalculate the cost of energy because with the power level contract "we are still being charged for electricity bills with bills exactly the same or higher than if we were open." And he also pointed out that they are asking the Buenos Aires Government for the early return of balances in favor of withholdings of gross income, that this tax is not charged for 180 days from the opening of the premises and that the collection be suspended for the same period. ABL.
ACE