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Venezuela’s Hunger Is No Game - WSJ

Venezuela’s Hunger Is No Game

 

 

Venezuela’s Hunger Is No Game - WSJ

Venezuela has long relied on oil dollars to pay for imports. But it also has grown corn, sorghum and rice, and it has had cattle, poultry and fishing industries. Now the nation is in trouble not only because of lower oil revenues and institutionalized corruption but also because government policies have badly damaged domestic production.

Among the many stupidities that socialism promotes is the idea that by imposing price controls and forbidding profits, government can make food both cheap and widely available.

The opposite is true, and Venezuela proves the rule. An August-September 2015 survey by the multi-university, Caracas-based social and economic research project Encovi found that 87% of those polled reported that they did not have sufficient income for food. Their privation is a result of artificially holding down prices, which creates shortages. Consumers are forced to scurry about black markets looking for what they need and then pay dearly for it—if they can. They face killer inflation which, according to the central bank, was 180.9% on an annual basis in the fourth quarter of 2015, up from 82.4% in the first quarter of last year.

More at:

http://www.wsj.com/articles/ve...s-no-game-1462738401

 

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Early on, Chavez implemented central planning -- agriculture included, with the predictable results.  As a historical reminder, czarist Russia used to be a world exporter of wheat.  After communism, Russia suffered decades of bad weather -- at least that was their excuse. 

In Venezuela, the government decided to grow corn in land where sugar cane was usually grown -- corn, of course, likes its feet dry.  Little corn grown, and no sugar cane.  Similarly, they set the price farmers could charge -- less than it cost to grow the crops and raise the cattle -- do I have to paint a picture!  A Englishman had a nice farm growing cacao for high end chocolate sold in the better stores in London like Harrads. Chavez nationalized his farm (did pay for it) and let the government run it.  First crop was OK.  After that, only the low end candy makers would buy the low quality stuff, 

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