Brenda Noemi Laguarta
ISFD N° 41
Teacher:
Stella Maris Saubidet Oyhamburu
Language
and Written Expression IV
Critical Food Sovereignty in Venezuela
It
cannot be denied that government policy regarding food distribution in
Venezuela is nowadays generating great controversy. Although the government has
included Food Sovereignty in national laws, Food Shortage seems to have no solution
for the time being. This is the reason why national authorities decided to
ration the amount of food that each person is allowed to buy, since there are
not enough supplies for the whole population. All this has a negative impact on
common citizens, who day after day have to manage to cover their basic needs.
“At 09:00 outside a downtown supermarket in Maracaibo, Venezuela, the
temperatures are already stiflingly hot - close to 40C (104F) in the shade, if
you can find any shade”. (Butler, 2013)
Long
queues at the entrance of every single supermarket, empty shelves, and lack of
essential food supplies are only vague attempts to describe what food-shortages
really imply for Venezuelan people. An international journalist travelled to
the country and reports his findings as follows (AntolĂnez, 2014):
In
one Bicentenario branch in the Plaza Venezuela people were
practically rioting to get chicken, a staple product that has become scarce
(...). It is normal in Caracas to have to visit several stores to obtain basic
foods. All shoppers are familiar with buying what you find, not what you want.
Some housewives are visibly pleased when they find a container of milk, after
three or four hours searching.
He
also summarizes the critical situation of the country pointing out that ‘the
shortage index has reached 28 percent’, which means that 28 of every 100
products such as chicken, milk, sugar, corn or wheat flour, butter and meat cannot
be found in the shelves. And the panorama turns even worse when we take into account
low wages. CENDA, a Caracas-based research institute, reports that ‘each
Venezuelan now needs four minimum
wages to meet basic expenses for food, clothing, and
health care’ (Cohen, 2014). "Right now I have to go to five or six
supermarkets to buy everything I need," says Gerardo Araujo, an
accountant. "Every day my salary is worth less and I lose my capacity to
buy goods," he says, blaming the government's inefficiency for the current
economic situation (Caselli, 2013). Taking into account the gloomy and undeniable
present state of things in Venezuela, an obvious question arises: How can this
be happening if Food Sovereignty is now part of the National Constitution and laws
of the country?
“Venezuela Is
Struggling With A Historic Food Shortage” (De Abreu,
2013)
When
approached from a superficial perspective, Food Shortages and Food Sovereignty are
simply a contradiction in terms, one not being related to the other in any
respect. However, a deeper consideration of these issues in addition to an
analysis of the historical background reveals the beginning of the conflict.
Heidi Chow, a campaign officer at World Development Movement -an international
organization fighting for economic justice and the end to global poverty-,
declares (Chow, 2012):
As Venezuela struck
oil in the 1920s, it became easier and cheaper to use oil money to import
foodstuffs and so many small farmers lost their livelihoods and poured into the
capital in search of work. Years of agricultural neglect followed leaving
Venezuela dangerously reliant on multinationals for their food supply and
distribution.
This led
Hugo Chavez to include in 2008 the radical concept of Food Sovereignty into the
country’s new constitution. The term was coined by La Via Campesina, a movement
of peasants, at the World Food Summit in 1996, and it makes reference to ‘the right of
peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food, and their right to define
their own food and agriculture systems’. Although this concept places people’s needs
for food at the centre of policies, Venezuela is obviously facing serious
difficulties in its application. This is due to the fact that the implementation
of this new system required a reduction of imported products with the objective
of promoting the growth of local economy. However, since the country economy
was mainly based on oil exportation, there was a very limited number of local
companies concerned with the production of food. All this provoked the existing
food shortage that daily affects more than 30.400.000 people around the
country.
The overall picture seems
to be that Food Sovereignty can certainly affect a country in a positive way
when applied after devoting careful consideration to it. It is definitely not
easy to implement, but it is not at all impossible. However, when such a
radical change is applied in order to change the economy of a whole country, as
is the case of Venezuela, and the government decides not to consider the
possible negative consequences for the people, millions of people undergo great
suffering.
Works
Cited
AntolĂnez,
D. (2014) Hunger for Breakfast? Venezuela Facing Chronic Food shortages. International Herald Tribune. Retrieved
on October 30, 2014 from http://www.iht.com/2014/03/10/hunger-for-breakfast-venezuela-facing-chronic-food-shortages/
Butler, E. (2013) Could Smuggling Be to Blame for Venezuela's Food
Shortages? BBC News Latin American &
Caribbean. Retrieved on October 30, 2014 from http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-23885377
Caselli, I. (2013) How food shortages are dividing Venezuela. BBC News Latin American & Caribbean. Retrieved
on October 30, 2014 from http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-22526622
Chow,
H. (2012) Food sovereignty in Venezuela. World
Development Movement. Retrieved on October 30, 2014 from http://www.wdm.org.uk/food-sovereignty/food-sovereignty-venezuela
Cohen,
B. (2014) Hugo Chavez,
One Year On.
Commentary. Retrieved on October 30, 2014 from http://www.commentarymagazine.com/topic/nicolas-maduro/
De Abreu, L. (2013) Venezuela Is Struggling With A Historic Food Shortage.
Business Insider. Retrieved on
October 30, 2014 from http://www.businessinsider.com/venezuela-food-shortage-2013-1
La Via Campesina (2006) What is Food Sovereignty? USFSA. Retrieved on October 30, 2014 from http://usfoodsovereigntyalliance.org/what-is-food-sovereignty/