Manchester attack: Salman Abedi named as bomber by police

• Less than a minute ago
• From the section UK

  

Eight-year-old Saffie Roussos and Georgina Callander are among the dead

Salman Abedi has been named by police as the suspected suicide bomber who killed 22 people and injured 59 at Manchester Arena on Monday night.

The 22-year-old was Manchester born and from a family of Libyan origin, the BBC understands.
Abedi, who had at least three siblings, had lived at several addresses in Manchester, including a property at Elsmore Road, Fallowfield, which was earlier raided by police.

So far three victims have been named - Saffie Rose Roussos, eight, Georgina Callander and John Atkinson, 28.

Greater Manchester Police said the priority was to establish whether Abedi had worked alone or not.

A vigil is being held in front of the town hall in Manchester's Albert Square.
'Vigil for peace' at Manchester's Albert Square

Abedi is thought to have blown himself up in the arena's foyer shortly after 22:30 BST on Monday, as fans were beginning to leave a concert by US singer Ariana Grande.

Greater Manchester Police Chief Constable Ian Hopkins passed on "heartfelt sympathies to all the innocent people caught up in last night's despicable act", adding that specially-trained family liaison officers were supporting families.

Eight-year-old Saffie Rose Roussos was a pupil at Tarleton Primary School, in Lancashire.
Her head teacher, Chris Upton, said she had been "simply a beautiful little girl in every aspect of the word" and was "loved by everyone".
John Atkinson was from Bury in Greater Manchester.
Student Georgina Callander, believed to have been 18, has also been named as among the dead.
She had been studying health and social care at Runshaw College in Leyland, Lancashire.

The wounded are being treated at eight hospitals around the city, with 12 children under the age of 16 among them.

Several people are still missing, including teenagers Laura MacIntyre and Eilidh MacLeod, from Barra in the Outer Hebrides, 15-year-old Olivia Campbell, Chloe Rutherford, 17, and Liam Curry, 19.

Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said police were in contact with Laura and Eilidh's families, adding: "It is hard for any of us to imagine the anguish that their families are going through right now.
"They are in our thoughts."

Theresa May says the Manchester attack was an act of 'sickening cowardice'

In a statement in Downing Street on Tuesday, the prime minister said the bombing had been a "callous terrorist attack" that targeted "defenceless young people".
Number 10 later said Mrs May - who is now in Manchester - had been updated "through [Monday] night" and had phoned Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn at 04:00 BST to brief him.

It is the worst terrorist attack in the UK since the 7 July bombings in 2005, in which 52 people were killed by four suicide bombers. 

So-called Islamic State has said - via IS channels on the messaging app Telegram - it was behind the Manchester attack, but this has not been verified.
In other developments:

• Relatives are using social media to hunt for missing loved ones, and an emergency number - 0800 096 0095 - has been set up
• Flags are flying at half mast outside Number 10 and political parties have suspended general election campaigning until further notice
• Theresa May chaired a meeting of the government's emergency Cobra committee and is now in Manchester where she has visited the children's hospital and signed the book of condolence at the Town Hall
• Extra armed officers will be deployed to Wembley and Twickenham on Saturday, while security at all upcoming events and venues in England are under review. The Met Police has also increased the numbers of officers on duty across the capital
• World leaders have expressed solidarity with the UK, including US President Donald Trump, who called those behind the attack "evil losers"
• Exam boards are telling schools directly affected by the attack that they can re-arrange GCSE and A-level exams in the wake of the attack
• Police have established a help centre at Manchester City's Etihad Stadium, access Gate 11, for anyone who needs assistance in tracing loved ones
• The Queen extended her "deepest sympathy" to all those affected and other senior royals have said they are "shocked and saddened"; Pope Francis offered "heartfelt solidarity" with the victims and their families
• Take That are among a number a performers who have cancelled concerts "out of respect", including for the rest of the week at Manchester Arena

Witnesses at the arena described seeing metal nuts and bolts among the debris of Monday's bomb, and spoke about the fear and confusion that gripped concert-goers. 

Andy Holey, who had gone to pick up his wife and daughter, said: "An explosion went off and it threw me about 30ft from one set of doors to the other set of doors."
Emma Johnson, who went to pick up her children, aged 15 and 17, said: "The whole building shook. There was a blast and then a flash of fire afterwards. There were bodies everywhere."
Teenager Abigail Walker, who was at the concert, told the BBC: "I had to make sure I had my sister. I grabbed hold of her and pulled hard. Everyone was running and crying.
"It was absolutely terrifying."

The explosion happened shortly after US singer Ariana Grande had left the stage and the 23-year-old actress-turned-singer, tweeted: "broken. from the bottom of my heart, i am so so sorry. i don't have words".

Controlled explosion

Armed police have also arrested a 23-year-old man in Chorlton, south Manchester, in connection with the attack.
Mr Hopkins said searches at two addresses had been carried out, including the one in Fallowfield, where a controlled explosion had been used to gain "safe" access.
He said Abedi had not been formally identified and so would not comment further.

 http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-40020168
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At least 22 dead, 50 injured, in suicide bomb attack at Manchester Arena

Greater Manchester police have confirmed children among the victims of the attack carried out by a man with an explosive device

Vikram Dodd, Helen Pidd and Kevin Rawlinson

Tuesday 23 May 2017 07.28 BST

 

Armed police at Manchester Arena after reports of an explosion at the venue during an Ariana Grande gig.

CLICK TO ENLARGE 

 

At least 22 people, including children, have been killed and 59 injured in a suicide bombing at a crowded pop concert in Manchester, the most deadly attack in Britain in a decade.

The horror unfolded at about 10.30pm on Monday at the end of a concert by the American singer Ariana Grande, whose music is popular with children and teenagers.

The attack, which took place in the foyer area of the arena, left hundreds of people fleeing in terror, with young people at the concert separated from their parents in the chaos. It left carnage inside the concert venue, with medics describing treating wounds consistent with shrapnel injury.

One witness said he could see nuts and bolts strewn on the floor of the foyer after the attack, which could suggest a nail bomb was involved.

Britain’s prime minister, Theresa May, said: “We are working to establish the full details of what is being treated by the police as an appalling terrorist attack. All our thoughts are with the victims and the families of those who have been affected.”
The attack came less than three weeks before Britain’s general election on 8 June and May has suspended her campaign, as have the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National party. Labour is expected to follow suit.

The PM will chair an emergency meeting of the government’s crisis committee, Cobra, at 9am on Tuesday.

The home secretary, Amber Rudd, paid tribute to emergency services, saying: “This was a barbaric attack, deliberately targeting some of the most vulnerable in our society – young people and children out at a pop concert. My thoughts and prayers go out to the families and victims who have been affected.”

Greater Manchester police have confirmed that they believe the bombing was the responsibility of one man armed with an improvised explosive device. The man is among the dead.

Chief constable Ian Hopkins said: “We have been treating this as a terrorist incident and we believe that while the attack last night was conducted by one man, the priority is to establish whether he was acting alone or as part of a network.”
“The attacker, I can confirm, died at the arena. We believe the attacker was carrying an improvised explosive device, which he detonated, causing this atrocity.”

The investigation into the attack involves the police counter-terrorism network and Britain’s domestic security service, MI5.

The death toll would make it the worst event of its kind in Britain since the 7/7 bombing in 2005, which hit London’s transport network, killing 52 people.

Witnesses in Manchester described how, after the concert had finished, the house lights came up and then a loud bang was heard. Majid Khan, 22, said:
“A huge bomb-like bang went off that hugely panicked everyone and we were all trying to flee the arena.
“It was one bang and essentially everyone from the other side of the arena where the bang was heard from suddenly came running towards us as they were trying to exit.”

Oliver Jones, 17, who attended with his 19-year-old sister, said:
 “The bang echoed around the foyer of the arena and people started to run.”

People outside the concert were visibly upset, as a cacophony of sirens were heard and police and ambulance vehicles arrived at the scene.

Erin McDougle, 20, from Newcastle said:
“There was a loud bang at the end of the concert. The lights were already on so we knew it wasn’t part of the show. At first we thought it was a bomb. There was a lot of smoke. People started running out. When we got outside the arena there were dozens of police vans and quite a few ambulances.”

A group of young men from Sheffield said they had seen at least five people covered in blood and others being carried out by bouncers.
 “Ariana Grande had just gone behind the curtain and the lights came up when there was this massive bang and a big cloud of smoke. I saw five people with blood all down them,” said one.
 
Sophie Tedd, 25, from Darlington, said, “Everyone started screaming and we nearly got trampled on. There was a burning smell.”

A woman with her husband and three young children said there was a loud bang as the concert ended. She said: “I just freaked. Everyone started screaming. We did not see any explosion but it smelled bad, like burning.”

The attack happened despite years of warnings and tightening of security, especially around crowded paces. Investigators will want to find out who carried out the attack and for what reason. They will also investigate where the material for the suspected device was bought and how it was designed.

Since the attack on London in 2005, measures have been put in place to restrict the purchase of materials that can be used to make homemade explosives.

The Manchester attack came after weeks of heightened activity and disrupted plots by police and MI5. In March, four people and the attacker died after an attack on Westminster, central London, which targeted the Houses of Parliament.

The terrorist threat level for Britain is at severe, meaning an attack is highly likely. Security is expected to be reviewed for major venues in Britain and elsewhere.
In the US, the Department of Homeland Security warned of extra security measures: “The public may experience increased security in and around public places and events as officials take additional precautions.”

In a statement just before 3am, Ian Hopkins, the chief constable of Greater Manchester police, said the police had received reports of an explosion at 10.33pm at the conclusion of the Ariana Grande concert.
He said: “We are currently treating this as a terrorist incident until we have further information, we are working closely with national counter-terrorism policing network and UK intelligence partners. This is clearly a very concerning time for everyone. We are doing all that we can, working with local and national agencies to support those affected as we gather information about what happened last night.”
Hopkins urged people to remain vigilant and to stay away from the area of the attack so emergency services could continue their work.

The Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, tweeted his sympathy for the victims: “Terrible incident in Manchester. My thoughts are with all those affected and our brilliant emergency services.”

The Liberal Democrat leader, Tim Farron, said: “This is a shocking and horrific attack targeting children and young people who were simply enjoying a concert,” and paid tribute to the emergency services.

Sir Richard Leese, leader of Manchester city council, said the incident was “horrifying”.
“If it is confirmed this was a terrorist attack it is a monstrous act but also a deeply futile one. Manchester is a proud and strong city and we will not allow those who seek to sow fear and division to achieve their aims,” he said.
“We give heartfelt thanks to our emergency services for their response and council staff are doing all they can to support.”

The metro mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, said: “My heart goes out to families who have lost loved ones, my admiration to our brave emergency services. “A terrible night for our great city.”

The Manchester Arena has a 21,000 capacity and is one of the largest music venues in Europe.

The ambulance service covering Manchester, which is dealing with a significant toll of wounded people, asked people to contact them only if they are in a life-threatening situation because of the “large number of resources” at the incident.

The Death Toll in Venezuela's Unrest Has Hit 51 as Divisions Emerge Among the Ruling Socialists

The Death Toll in Venezuela's Unrest Has Hit 51 as Divisions Emerge Among the Ruling Socialists

Alexandra Ulmer and Maria Ramirez / Reuters

Opposition activists clash with riot policemen during a protest against the government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, in Caracas on May 22, 2017

(CARACAS/PUERTO ORDAZ, Venezuela) —
Venezuela's state prosecutor has panned unpopular President Nicolas Maduro's plan to create a grassroots congress, deepening a rare public split among the ruling Socialists as the death toll from two months of unrest hit 51.

Chief State Prosecutor Luisa Ortega stunned the crisis-hit country in March when she lambasted the Supreme Court for annulling the powers of the opposition-led National Assembly.

Since then, she has been a wild card within the publicly homogenous Venezuelan government, whose foes accuse it of seeking to dodge elections by creating a parallel assembly with powers to rewrite the constitution.

Socialist Party official Elias Jaua, in charge of the "constituent assembly" project, confirmed on Monday that Ortega had written him to express her discontent in a letter that was previously leaked on social media.

"It is my imperative to explain the reasons for which I have decided not to participate in this activity," Ortega's two-page missive reads.

"Instead of bringing stability or generating a climate of peace, I think this will accelerate the crisis," she said, mentioning it would heighten uncertainty and alter the "unbeatable" constitution launched under late leader Hugo Chavez.

Jaua acknowledged receipt of Ortega's letter, but quickly said she was merely expressing a "political opinion," without any power to change the situation.

"We consider that the only organ the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela's constitution empowers to interpret the constitution is the Supreme Court's constitutional chamber," he said at a news conference, in reference to the pro-government top court.

Venezuelans are scrutinizing Maduro's government and the armed forces for any cracks as protesters take to the streets daily to demand early elections, humanitarian aid to alleviate food and medicine shortages, and freedom for jailed activists.While there are no outward signs of major fissures that would destabilize 18-years of 'Chavista' rule, demonstrators have been cheered by Ortega's public dissent and by some public denunciations of officials by their relatives.

Rising death toll

While anti-government protests have brought hundreds of thousands to the streets, Venezuelans are increasingly concerned about spates of nighttime looting and barricades popping up in many neighborhoods.

Masked youths man roadblocks, turning back traffic or asking motorists for a monetary "collaboration" to be allowed through.

The worst nighttime unrest has largely been concentrated outside the capital, however, with the jungle and savannah state of Bolivar hard-hit overnight.

Some 51 buses were burned after a group attacked a transport company in the city of Puerto Ordaz, the prosecutor's office said on Monday. Barricades and clashes with the National Guard were also rippling through the city on Monday, according to a Reuters witness.

There also was trouble on Monday in Barinas, the rural state where Chavez was born and which is regarded by his supporters as the "cradle of the revolution."

Mobs burned the headquarters of the Socialist Party in the state capital, and clashes and looting raged throughout the day, witnesses and authorities said.

Several opposition leaders have condemned the violence, but the episodes highlight the risks of protests spinning out of their control amid widespread anger at Maduro, hunger, and easy access to weapons in one of the world's most violence countries.

Maduro accuses his opponents of an "armed insurrection," backed by the United States, his ideological foe.

His government blames "fascist" protesters for looting and deaths in the unrest since early April.

The death toll increased to at least 51 people after a policeman, Jorge Escandon, died after being injured in Carabobo state and three people died in protests in Barinas, the prosecutor's office said on Monday.

Hundreds of people also have been injured and more than 2,600 arrested, with about 1,000 still jailed, according to rights groups.

On Monday, opposition supporters and doctors in white robes tried to march to the Health Ministry in Caracas to demand access to proper treatment amid major shortages of medicines ranging from painkillers to chemotherapy drugs.

"Today, I'm not here as a lawmaker, I'm here marching for my sister who has a cerebral tumor, a tumor that is growing again and producing paralysis, a tumor for which Venezuela used to receive medicine and the injections for this not to happen," said opposition lawmaker Miguel Pizarro.

"Today I walk for my brother, who is diabetic, and who, like my mom, can't find medicine," added Pizarro, part of a new generation of opposition leaders who have been at the forefront of protests and often been tear-gassed.

In a scene repeated over and over in recent weeks, security forces fired tear gas at demonstrators and clashes erupted with hooded youths who threw rocks.

http://time.com/4789822/venezuela-unrest-maduro-congress/
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Venezuela's irreconcilable visions for the future

By Vanessa Buschschlüter BBC News, Caracas

• 22 May 2017

 Signs reading "No more dictatorship" are a common sight at anti-government protests
 

"Venezuela is now a dictatorship," says Luis Ugalde, a Spanish-born Jesuit priest who during his 60 years living in Venezuela has become one of the South American nation's most well-known political scientists.

A former rector of the Andres Bello Catholic University in Caracas, Mr Ugalde does not mince his words.
He compares Venezuela to an ailing patient who is on the brink of being killed off by well-meaning but incompetent doctors.
Venezuela's problems are not new, he says. At their heart is the mistaken belief that it is a rich country.
He argues that while it may have the world's largest proven oil reserves, Venezuela should be considered overwhelmingly poor because it hardly produces anything except oil.

The curse of oil

A lack of investment in anything but the booming oil industry in the 20th Century meant that its human talent was never really fostered and its economy never diversified, resulting in an absolute reliance on imports.
Venezuela's late leader, Hugo Chávez, further compounded the illusion of Venezuela's wealth to the detriment of the country, Mr Ugalde argues.

While oil prices were high, Hugo Chavez could afford to fund social programmes

"He told the Venezuelan people that there were three things standing between them and prosperity: the US empire, the rich and the entrenched political elite, and that he would deal with all three so that the people could enjoy Venezuela's wealth."
Investing Venezuela's oil revenue in generous social programmes, building homes and health care centres, expanding educational opportunities and providing the poorest with benefits they did not previously have, gave the government of President Chavez a wide support base.
But with falling global oil prices, government coffers soon emptied and investment in social programmes dwindled.
The death from cancer of President Chávez in 2013 further hit the governing socialist PSUV party hard.
His successor in office, Nicolas Maduro, lacked not only the charisma of President Chávez but also his unifying presence at the top of the party and the country.
Mr Ugalde does not doubt that President Maduro came to power democratically in 2013.

Luis Ugalde says that Venezuela has become a dictatorship

But he argues that what he has done since - such as undermining Venezuela's separation of powers - has turned him into a dictator.
The Democratic Unity Roundtable opposition coalition won a landslide in the December 2015 election and yet it has seen almost all of its decisions overturned by the Supreme Court, a body which opposition politicians say is stacked with government loyalists.
An attempt by opposition politicians to organise a recall referendum to oust President Maduro from power was thwarted at every step by Venezuela's electoral council, another body opposition politicians say is dominated by supporters of Mr Maduro.

'Final straw'

But for many the final straw came on 29 March 2017, when Supreme Court judges issued a ruling stripping the National Assembly of its powers and transferring those powers to the court.
While the Supreme Court suspended the most controversial paragraphs just three days later, the ruling managed to unite the hitherto divided opposition and spur them into action.
There have been almost daily protests and more than 45 people have been killed in protest-related violence.
While many of those protesting against the government share Mr Ugalde's view, the government is adamant it is defending democracy in Venezuela.
It argues that the National Assembly was in contempt when it swore in three lawmakers suspected of having been elected fraudulently and that all of the decisions made by the legislative body since then are therefore invalid.

New constitution call

The government has responded to the most recent wave of protests by calling for a constituent assembly.
Drawing up a new constitution will bring together the people of Venezuela and create peace where there is now unrest, President Maduro argues.
He also says he wants to enshrine some of the social programmes created by the socialist government in the new constitution.

At a pro-government rally, a sergeant in the National Bolivarian Militia, a body created by the late President Hugo Chavez, says he whole-heartedly backs the idea.
"We're against terrorism, those people protesting violently who're burning buses, we support the constituent assembly," Gerardo Barahonde says.
Marta Elena Flores, 60, says the opposition is "out to wreck everything" achieved under the socialist government.
"We need to protect all the benefits the government has given to the people," she says.
"We need to enshrine them in the constitution so that the opposition doesn't even have the chance to rob us of them."
"I personally have been able to have two operations thanks to the government's medical programmes. The opposition begrudges us those benefits."

Opposition politicians have been dismissive of the president's call for a constituent assembly, saying it is a ruse to delay overdue regional elections and further strengthen the power of President Maduro.
Representatives of the major opposition parties declined a government invitation to discuss the creation of the assembly and, three weeks after the idea was first mooted by President Maduro, little progress has been made.
Previous attempts at dialogue backed by former international leaders and even the Vatican have failed.

Anti-government marches meanwhile have been spreading throughout the country and clashes between protesters and the security forces have become more frequent and the number of dead has been on the rise.
Those opposed to the government say they are determined to keep the protests going until fresh general elections are called and the government is ousted.
Some analysts have said that what it will take for the government to fall is for the protests to spread to the "barrios", the poor neighbourhoods which have been the support base of the governing socialist party.

Miguel Pizarro, an opposition lawmaker who represents the barrio of Petare, one of the poorest in Caracas, dismisses that argument.
"The only contact people who make that argument have with the barrio is through their cleaning lady," he says.
"There has been resistance to the government in the barrios for a long time, that is how I got elected!"
Others think that it will take the military to switch sides for the government to be ousted.
But with Defence Minister Vladimir Padrino taking to Twitter on 20 May to accuse protesters of fomenting anarchy and international organisations of being "immoral accomplices who don't denounce the violence" there is little sign of that happening any time soon, at least within the highest ranks.
In the short term at least, there seems little chance of the current deadlock in Venezuela being broken and every likelihood that the crisis will worsen.



http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-39980403
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/venezuelas-paradox-people-are-hungry-but-farmers-cant-feed-them/2017/05/21/ce460726-3987-11e7-a59b-26e0451a96fd_story.html?utm_term=.ec5032e09a10

Venezuela’s paradox: People are hungry, but farmers can’t feed them

A once-packed henhouse stands empty on Saulo Escobar’s farm in Aragua state, Venezuela, earlier this month. (Mariana Zuñiga for The Washington Post)

 

 

By Mariana Zuñiga and Nick Miroff May 22 at 2:47 PM

 

YUMA, Venezuela — With cash running low and debts piling up, Venezuela’s socialist government has cut back sharply on food imports. And for farmers in most countries, that would present an opportunity.

But this is Venezuela, whose economy operates on its own special plane of dysfunction. At a time of empty supermarkets and spreading hunger, the country’s farms are producing less and less, not more, making the caloric deficit even worse.
Drive around the countryside outside the capital, Caracas, and there’s everything a farmer needs: fertile land, water, sunshine and gasoline at 4 cents a gallon, cheapest in the world. Yet somehow families here are just as scrawny-looking as the city-dwelling Venezuelans waiting in bread lines or picking through garbage for scraps.

Having attempted for years to defy conventional economics, the country now faces a painful reckoning with basic arithmetic.

“Last year I had 200,000 hens,” said Saulo Escobar, who runs a poultry and hog farm here in the state of Aragua, an hour outside Caracas. “Now I have 70,000.”
Several of his cavernous henhouses sit empty because, Escobar said, he can’t afford to buy more chicks or feed. Government price controls have made his business unprofitable, and armed gangs have been squeezing him for extortion payments and stealing his eggs.

Venezuela’s latest public health indicators confirm that the country is facing a dietary calamity. With medicines scarce and malnutrition cases soaring, more than 11,000 babies died last year, sending the infant mortality rate up 30 percent, according to Venezuela’s Health Ministry. The head of the ministry was fired by President Nicolás Maduro two days after she released those statistics.

Child hunger in parts of Venezuela is a “humanitarian crisis,” according to a new report by the Catholic relief organization Caritas, which found 11.4 percent of children under age 5 suffering from moderate to severe malnutrition, and 48 percent “at risk” of going hungry.

‘The Maduro diet’

 

The protesters who have been marching in the streets against Maduro for the past seven weeks scream, “We’re hungry!” as riot police blast them with water cannons and tear gas.

In a recent survey of 6,500 Venezuelan families by the country’s leading universities, three-quarters of adults said they lost weight in 2016 — an average of 19 pounds. This collective emaciation is referred to dryly here as “the Maduro diet,” but it’s a level of hunger almost unheard-of outside war zones or areas ravaged by hurricane, drought or plague. 

Venezuela’s disaster is man-made, economists point out — the result of farm nationalizations, currency distortions and a government takeover of food distribution. While millions of Venezuelans can’t get enough to eat, officials have refused to allow international aid groups to deliver food, accustomed to viewing their oil-rich country as the benefactor of poorer nations, not a charity case. 
“It’s not only the nationalization of land,” said Carlos Machado, an expert on Venezuelan agriculture. “The government has made the decision to be the producer, processor and distributor, so the entire chain of food production suffers from an inefficient agricultural bureaucracy.”

With Venezuela’s industrial output crashing, farmers are forced to import feed, fertilizer and spare parts, but they can’t do so without hard currency. And the government has been hoarding the dollars it earns from oil exports to pay back high-interest loans from Wall Street and other foreign creditors.

Escobar said he needs 400 tons of high-protein imported animal feed every three months to keep his operation running, but he’s able to get only 100 tons. So, like many others, he’s turned to the black market. But he can only afford a cheaper, less nutritious feed, meaning that his hens are smaller than they used to be — and so are their eggs.

“My quality went down, so my production went down, too,” he said.

Escobar’s hogs also are skinnier. An average full-size pig weighed 242 pounds two years ago, he said. “Now they weigh 176.” Last year, he lost 2,000 hogs in three months when the animals got sick and he couldn’t find vaccines.
The piglets born since then are undersized. Many have bloody wounds at the tips of their ears. “When an animal has a poor diet, it looks for nourishment elsewhere,” explained Maria Arias, a veterinarian at the farm. “So they end up chewing off the ears of other pigs.”

‘There are no profits’

 

Venezuela has long relied on imports of certain foodstuffs, such as wheat, that can’t be grown on a large scale in the country’s tropical climate. But trade statistics show that the land policies of the late Hugo Chávez, Maduro’s predecessor, made Venezuela more dependent on imported food than ever.

When oil prices were high, that wasn’t a big problem. Now Venezuela’s blend of heavy crude is worth barely $40 a barrel and the country’s petroleum output is at a 23-year low, in part because refineries and pipelines are breaking down and investment in new infrastructure isn’t keeping pace.

The government hasn’t published farming data in years. But Machado, the agriculture expert, said annual food imports averaged about $75 per person until 2004, then soared after Chávez accelerated the nationalization of farms, eventually seizing more than 10 million acres. The government expropriated factories, too, and Venezuela’s domestic food production plummeted.

By 2012, annual per capita food imports had increased to $370, but since then, oil prices have slumped and imports have dropped 73 percent.

Instead of spurring growth in domestic agriculture, the government has strangled it, farmers say. Domestic production of rice, corn and coffee has declined by 60 percent or more in the past decade, according to Venezuela’s Confederation of Farmer Associations (Fedeagro), a trade group. Nearly all of the sugar mills nationalized by the government since 2005 are paralyzed or producing below capacity.

Only a small, well-off minority of Venezuelans can afford to buy much food on the black market, where a pound of rice imported from Brazil or Colombia sells for about 6,000 bolivares. That’s roughly $1 at the black-market exchange rate, but for an ordinary Venezuelan worker it’s an entire day’s wage, because the bolivar has lost 99 percent of its value in the past five years.

Venezuelans who don’t have access to hard currency depend on government-subsidized groceries doled out by pro-Maduro neighborhood groups, or wait in supermarket lines for rationed, price-capped items. Those who join anti-government protests have been threatened with losing their food supplies.
The price controls have become a powerful disincentive in rural Venezuela. “There are no profits, so we produce at a loss,” said one dairy farmer in the state of Guarico, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he feared retaliation from authorities. To get a new tractor, he said, he would have to spend all the money he earns in a year. “It’s a miracle that the industry is still alive,” he said.
Four of his cows were stolen this month, probably by hungry families in the nearby village, he said.

According to Vicente Carrillo, the former president of Venezuela’s cattle ranchers’ association, the overall size of the country’s herd has dropped in the past five years from 13 million head to about 8 million.

Carrillo sold his ranch more than a decade ago, tired of threats from squatters and rural activists who accused him of being an exploitative rural capitalist. His family had owned the land for more than a century. “I dedicated more than 30 years of my life to this business, but I had to leave everything behind,” he said.
Escobar, the chicken and hog farmer, said the only way for farmers to remain in business today is to break the law and sell at market prices, hoping authorities look the other way.

“If I sold at regulated prices, I wouldn’t even be able to afford a single kilogram of chicken feed,” he said.

If it’s not a fear of the government that keeps Escobar awake at night, it’s criminal gangs. Since one of his delivery trucks was robbed in December, he has been forced to make “protection” payments to a mafia boss operating out of the local prison. Every Friday, three motorcycles stop by the farm to pick up an envelope of cash, he said. Calling the police would only escalate the danger.
“I know how to deal with chickens and pigs,” Escobar said, “but not criminals.”