QUITO (Reuters) – Ecuador’s popular President Rafael Correa is expected to win a referendum next week that his opponents — including his brother — say will extend his control over the judiciary and restrict the media.

A victory would reinforce Correa’s lead over his often hapless rivals who are expected to run for president in 2013 elections in the Andean nation of 14 million people.

BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) – Argentina’s largest real estate company, IRSA, is considering selling global bonds this year to finance expansion plans at home and abroad, Chairman Eduardo Elsztain said on Friday.

Last year, IRSA (IRS.BA: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz)(IRS.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) became one of the first Argentine companies to sell foreign debt since a massive 2002 sovereign debt default, which battered private companies’ credit ratings and sent lending rates soaring.

BUENOS AIRES, Feb 16 (Reuters) – Argentine trade unions
representing workers at key grain ports have called off plans
for further protests after reaching a wage agreement with
export companies, a union leader said on Wednesday.

Trade unions and grains exporters met for last-ditch wage
talks to try to avert a new strike after workers last month
blocked ports in one of the world’s top food suppliers.

By Eduardo Garcia

BUENOS AIRES (Reuters Life!) – Forget potted plants and privet hedges; a group of Buenos Aires artists want to make the Argentine capital a free-for-all kitchen garden, turning neglected parks and verges into verdant vegetable patches.

Following in the footsteps of “guerrilla gardeners” who have been scattering flower seeds in vacant lots and roadsides in cities such as London and New York since the 1970s, the Articultores group is taking the concept a step further.

BUENOS AIRES, Dec 22 (Reuters) – A strike by soy-processing
workers in Argentina’s biggest grains port halted at least six
plants on Wednesday, disrupting crushing in the world’s No. 1
soyoil and meal exporter and helping lift U.S. soyoil futures.

Crushing plants in and around the city of Rosario account
for about 80 percent of Argentine soybean oil and meal output
and the one-day-old pay strike is hitting plants owned by major
exporters such as Cargill, Louis Dreyfus and Bunge .

BUENOS AIRES, Nov 19 (Reuters) – Argentina’s economy is
growing strongly, but at a slower pace than in previous months,
the country’s economic activity indicator showed on Friday.

The EMAE economic activity index — a close proxy of gross
domestic product — rose 7.8 percent in September versus the
same month last year, according to the INDEC statistics agency
ARECI14, the slowest year-on-year pace since March.

BUENOS AIRES, Nov 11 (Reuters) – Argentine lawmakers
postponed a vote on Thursday on the government’s 2011 budget
bill, but defiant officials said President Cristina Fernandez
will simply extend this year’s framework if the bill stalls.

The delay is a setback for the center-left leader, whose
drive to tap up to $7.5 billion in central bank reserves to pay
debt would free up more money for social spending ahead of next
October’s presidential election.

BUENOS AIRES, Oct 26 (Reuters) – Latin American steelmakers
see an increasing threat from cheap Chinese imports and want
governments in the region to take steps to guarantee fair play,
a regional chamber said on Wednesday.

Regional powerhouse Brazil introduced measures last week
aimed at curbing imports of cheap steel products made in China
that Brazilian steelmakers complain are flooding the market.
[ID:nN22224134]

BUENOS AIRES, Oct 8 (Reuters) – An Argentine court has
indicted two executives of agribusiness giant Cargill [CARG.UL]
for suspected tax evasion, the tax agency said on Friday.

Last week, authorities raided the local premises of fellow
global grains exporter Bunge (BG.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) after the AFIP tax agency
accused the company of evading close to $300 million in income
tax between 2007 and 2009. [ID:nN07150061]. Bunge has denied
the charge.

BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) – European Union Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht said on Wednesday the only way to resolve a dispute over U.S. government subsidies to Boeing was to reach “a negotiated settlement.”

The EU said it had won a dispute against the subsidies for Boeing that it hoped would set the stage for negotiated settlement that would allow European governments to continue to help Airbus develop new aircraft.