Posted on 01/09/2005 5:10:55 PM PST by Kitten Festival
I have mentioned Carlos Machado Allison in this blog before. He is retired from Universidad Central de Venezuela, was President of the Venezuelan National Fund for Agrarian Research .... He is just finishing a book called “Agriculture in Venezuela”. Today he is interviewed in page 3 of El Nacional ... here are some excerpts:
“The agricultural states are the poorest of the country”
On the state being the biggest landowner:
“This is true; it has so much that it does not even know what it has. Some say it has 8 million hectares, other say 20 million. But there is no census…”
Is controlling the land, controlling production?
“Exactly the opposite. What the Government has to do is to promote the pure and simple sale of the enormous extensions it has, get rid of the bureaucratic load that it implies being the owner of land, mostly unproductive and end the legal fight of who owns them”
Do you think the state can reactivate the agricultural sector when it distributes the intervened land?
“In this country, rural people have always been discriminated against and I think it is impossible to develop in a place where people are not the owners of what they have. If I am not the owner of a farm, I am not going to invest in it. If the land continues belonging to the Government and they offer to end them to me I am not going to produce beyond the “conuco” (Parcel of land owned by small farmers). The policy should be one of regularizing not intervening the land.”
The Governors say these measures are to fight against the large farm state and guarantee a basic supply of foodstuffs.
The first thing that has to be made clear is ...
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.salon.com ...
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