As warned by the president of the Venezuelan Seed Association (Avesem), Aurelio Sanchez, the country's agricultural sector faces a shortage of inputs to meet the demand imposed by the domestic market. The national economic activity is severely limited by the lack of fertilizers, agrochemicals, and seeds, plus the country's lack of fuel and recurrent power outages.
As the planting season nears and producers lack raw materials, the representative of Avesem expects an increase in the cost of vegetables, which has already been felt in the Venezuelan markets. At a vegetable fair located in Caracas, a kilo of tomatoes this week marked a price of 32,000 bolivars, an amount that represents almost a minimum wage.
In an interview with Union Radio, Sanchez said that only 20,000 of the 80,000 hectares of vegetables that should have been planted were currently planted. He also stressed that the seed deficit had been getting worse since 2016 and that they currently don't even have 3% of what they require. Despite this, the country is not importing seeds because the agricultural sector has a debt of 20 million dollars with its suppliers.
Sanchez said that, according to a study carried out together with the Confederation of Associations of Agricultural Producers (Fedeagro), the sector requires more than 30 million dollars to reactivate its production and have a long and medium-term action plan.
The national government approved a loan to boost the 2019-2020 Planting Plan in order to increase the production of certain items to move towards the country's food sovereignty; however, experts in the field say that the amount has been insufficient.
Based on the numbers of Fedeagro, the Venezuelan countryside requires an investment of $ 1,500,000,000 to reactivate and cultivate the 2,500,000 hectares with the potential to produce 55 plant items.
Source: analitica.com