BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA — In an effort to prevent domestic grain shortages and put a cap on rising food prices, the Argentine government on Dec. 17 announced it would place a quota on exported corn and wheat in the 2021-22 marketing year, Reuters reported.

Corn exports will be limited to 41.6 million tonnes while wheat shipments will be capped at 12.5 million tonnes, the report said.

“This is so we don’t compromise supply to the domestic market,” Julián Domínguez, agriculture minister, told Reuters.

Argentina, which is the world’s second biggest corn exporter and the primary wheat supplier to South American countries, exported 39.8 million tonnes of corn and 11.2 million tonnes of wheat in 2020-21.

The US Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) projects Argentina will post record-high production in corn (54 million tonnes) and wheat (20 million tonnes) in 2021-22.

“Formal or informal self-regulations, or this quota for wheat and corn, harm the country and harm us all,” Nicolás Pino, president of the Argentine Rural Society, told Reuters, adding that the move would lead to an “artificial oversupply.”

Argentina had put a quota on beef exports but recently relaxed those limits.