A Food Fight for Hugo Chavez

[naaman fletcher]

Supplying low-cost food to the poor has been a centerpiece of Chávez's presidency. He has expropriated food processors, stores, and more than 6 million acres of farms and ranches, convinced that the government can feed Venezuela better than the private sector does. Under state ownership, though, production has suffered. From 1999 to 2008, per capita, sugar cane was off by 8%, fruit declined by 25%, and beef production dropped by 38%, according to Carlos Machado, an expert in agriculture at the Institute of Higher Administrative Studies, a business school in Caracas. "The cooperatives have failed and our cattle ranching has been decimated," Machado says.


http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_12/b4171046603604.htm

[protocol rv]

1. Maybe our American friends would like to come with Sean Penn

And start a commune to raise cattle around Maracay.

[EFerrari]

2. This is so fascinating.

IESA is private grad business school. It is the SA cognate of ICAE in Central America which according to Source Watch, was developed by USAID, the private business sector of Central America and Harvard Business School:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INCAE

And in fact, if you search IESA, you can find all sorts of interesting things, like Patricia Marquez, academic director at the school was also concurrently a columnist for El Nacional in 2004. And that they routinely produce anti-Chavez material, such as this one:

Venezuela: Crowding out the Opposition (2007)

http://www.offnews.info/downloads/CorralesPenfoldJODApril%202007pp%2099-113.pdf


Thanks, namaan. I didn't know about this institution!

[naaman fletcher]

3. So, you are saying that the facts in this story are not true? nt

[EFerrari]

4. Not yet. But the source is not uninterested. n/t

[naaman fletcher]

5. I'm cool with that, as long as same standard is applied to venezuelanalysis. nt

[EFerrari]

6. Of course. Edit: But, Venezuelanalysis doesn't have

storefronts to try to hide their position. The school nowhere advertises its affiliations, you have to go hunting for them. That's not the same standard of disclosure, is it?

[protocol rv]

7. But the report is true

Shooting this messenger is so popular nowadays...but the message remains.

[EFerrari]

8. And how do you know that? Have these numbers been veriifed somewhere?

If so, I'd like to know that.