Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's government announced a decree giving officials the power to take control of food distributors caught hoarding or halting supply, a move aimed at easing severe shortages of meats, milk and sugar in Venezuela's supermarkets.
The decree -- part of the government's sweeping reforms toward socialism under Chavez -- will likely stoke continuing fears over threats to private property, particularly among supermarket owners and food storage companies.
Industry and Commerce Minister Maria Cristina Iglesias told a news conference that the legislation will take effect upon its publication in the official gazette this week.
Industry officials blame the shortages on price controls that oblige retailers to sell at a loss, while the government points the finger at unscrupulous speculators, including supermarket owners and distributors, who hoard food or boost prices.
Iglesias said the law would give the government, along with municipal authorities and "communal councils," or neighborhood assemblies, authority over food distribution and sales if private companies such as supermarket chains halt their operations.
The forthcoming decree "puts ... food commercialization in the hands of the people and the revolutionary government," she said.
Iglesias did not provide specific details of the decree, saying only that the new legislation would "permit, in extreme cases, the re-establishment of an essential public service."
The Venezuelan National Assembly, which is entirely controlled by a coalition of pro-Chavez parties, approved a law last month that granted the Venezuelan leader authority to enact sweeping measures by presidential decree as his government steers this poverty-stricken South American country toward socialism.
Privately owned supermarkets suspended sales of beef earlier last week after one chain was shut down for 48 hours for pricing meat above government-set levels. Most items can still be found, but only by paying higher prices at grocery stores or on the black market.
Authorities have raided warehouses and confiscated tonnes of food -- mostly beef and sugar -- they said was hoarded by vendors unwilling to sell inventories at the official price.
Iglesias urged Venezuelans to provide authorities with information regarding distribution chains or storage facilities where goods are being hoarded so the food could be confiscated and sold directly to consumers.
Full-page government ads published in newspapers on Sunday showed a fake mug shot under the title "The Hoarder Is a Criminal" and warned consumers not to purchase foods at exorbitant prices.
FORUM: The Solomon Islands’ move to bar Taiwan, the US and others from the Pacific Islands Forum has sparked criticism that Beijing’s influence was behind the decision Tuvaluan Prime Minister Feletei Teo said his country might pull out of the region’s top political meeting next month, after host nation Solomon Islands moved to block all external partners — including China, the US and Taiwan — from attending. The Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) leaders’ meeting is to be held in Honiara in September. On Thursday last week, Solomon Islands Prime Minister Jeremiah Manele told parliament that no dialogue partners would be invited to the annual gathering. Countries outside the Pacific, known as “dialogue partners,” have attended the forum since 1989, to work with Pacific leaders and contribute to discussions around
END OF AN ERA: The vote brings the curtain down on 20 years of socialist rule, which began in 2005 when Evo Morales, an indigenous coca farmer, was elected president A center-right senator and a right-wing former president are to advance to a run-off for Bolivia’s presidency after the first round of elections on Sunday, marking the end of two decades of leftist rule, preliminary official results showed. Bolivian Senator Rodrigo Paz was the surprise front-runner, with 32.15 percent of the vote cast in an election dominated by a deep economic crisis, results published by the electoral commission showed. He was followed by former Bolivian president Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga in second with 26.87 percent, according to results based on 92 percent of votes cast. Millionaire businessman Samuel Doria Medina, who had been tipped
Outside Havana, a combine belonging to a private Vietnamese company is harvesting rice, directly farming Cuban land — in a first — to help address acute food shortages in the country. The Cuban government has granted Agri VAM, a subsidiary of Vietnam’s Fujinuco Group, 1,000 hectares of arable land in Los Palacios, 118km west of the capital. Vietnam has advised Cuba on rice cultivation in the past, but this is the first time a private firm has done the farming itself. The government approved the move after a 52 percent plunge in overall agricultural production between 2018 and 2023, according to data
ELECTION DISTRACTION? When attention shifted away from the fight against the militants to politics, losses and setbacks in the battlefield increased, an analyst said Recent clashes in Somalia’s semi-autonomous Jubaland region are alarming experts, exposing cracks in the country’s federal system and creating an opening for militant group al-Shabaab to gain ground. Following years of conflict, Somalia is a loose federation of five semi-autonomous member states — Puntland, Jubaland, Galmudug, Hirshabelle and South West — that maintain often fractious relations with the central government in the capital, Mogadishu. However, ahead of elections next year, Somalia has sought to assert control over its member states, which security analysts said has created gaps for al-Shabaab infiltration. Last week, two Somalian soldiers were killed in clashes between pro-government forces and
RSS