Bolivia’s diesel crisis drags on as farmers rally for solution

The search for a solution to the diesel crisis is far from over in Bolivia, as hundreds of cocoa farmers and supporters staged their latest protest on Friday, months after their first uproar on the government’s decision to remove longstanding fuel subsidies. 

Subsidy cuts divide farmers and state 

Tension between farmers and the government began in December 2025, when the state of emergency declaration and issuance of Decree 5503 by President Rodrigo Paz’s new administration led to scrapping twenty years of subsidised fuel prices, increasing petrol by 86 per cent and diesel by around 162 per cent.

Clashes lasted for a week, with police resorting to tear gas and rubber bullets against striking miners near Congress.

Farming and labour groups eventually reached an agreement to have the decree repealed.

However, the truce barely delivered any resolution to the issue after Bolivia faced a serious diesel shortage by March.

The shortage’s effect in the main farming department in Santa Cruz had pushed growers to block highways connecting the region, rallying that the shortfall put their soybean, corn and rice harvests at risk.

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Diesel scarcity chokes the harvest

Disruption has only escalated since producers pointed to shrinking foreign currency reserves and declining domestic gas output as triggering factors of the scarcity, warning that it could double the debt of struggling farmers and leave crops stranded in the fields.

Rage over the shortage extended in July when drivers also launched fresh protests, and industry figures warned late in the month that inadequate diesel could burden Santa Cruz with a loss of roughly 800,000 tonnes of winter-sown soybeans.

Some regional farm chambers, including in Cochabamba, have even moved to arrange their own fuel imports rather than wait on the state.

The standoff underscores a harder truth for a country where agriculture is central to the economy. Bolivians’ patience is being stretched by a government that finds scrapping a subsidy easier and more effective than rebuilding a reliable fuel supply.

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