Venezuela Passes Law Banning GMOs

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The National Assembly of Venezuela, in its final session before a neoliberal dominated opposition takes the helm of legislative power on January 5, passed one of the most progressive seed laws in the world on December 23, 2015; it was promptly signed into law by President Nicolas Maduro. On December 29, during his television show, “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjpeKFWqifc">In Contact with Maduro, number 52</a>,” Maduro <a href="http://laiguana.tv/articulos/19448-ley-de-semillas-seguridad-soberania-alimentaria-venezuela">said</a> that the new seed law provides the conditions to produce food “under an agro-ecological model that respects the pacha mama (mother earth) and the right of our children to grow up healthy, eating healthy.” The law is a victory for the international movements for agroecology and food sovereignty because it bans transgenic (GMO) seed while protecting local seed from privatization. The law is also a product of direct participatory democracy –the people as legislator– in Venezuela, because it was hammered out through a deliberative partnership between members of the country’s National Assembly and a broad-based grassroots coalition of eco-socialist, peasant, and agroecological oriented organizations and institutions. This essay provides an overview of the phenomenon of people as legislator, a summary of the new Seed Law, and an appendix with an unofficial translation of some of the articles of the law.</span><div> <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br></span></div> <div> <img alt="Screen Shot 2015-12-31 at 10.52.05 AM" src="http://uziiw38pmyg1ai60732c4011.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/dropzone/2015/12/Screen-Shot-2015-12-31-at-10.52.05-AM-510x492.png"></div></div>

Venezuela Passes Law Banning GMOs

The National Assembly of Venezuela, in its final session before a neoliberal dominated opposition takes the helm of legislative power on Ja...

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Venezuela Supermarket Lines Swell As Shoppers Scramble To Buy Basics - National Troops Dispatched To Maintain Order!

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br><br>Lines are swelling at Venezuelan supermarkets, with some shoppers showing up before dawn in search of products ranging from chicken to laundry detergent, as a holiday slowdown in deliveries sharpened the nation's nagging product shortages.<br><br><br><br><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-EtD4YDxReXE/VLUJ_3E7t5I/AAAAAAABtJA/J_T10l5N3hU/s1600/venezuela_economic_crisis01.jpg"><img border="0" height="426" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-EtD4YDxReXE/VLUJ_3E7t5I/AAAAAAABtJA/J_T10l5N3hU/s640/venezuela_economic_crisis01.jpg" width="640"></a></span></div>

Venezuela Supermarket Lines Swell As Shoppers Scramble To Buy Basics - National Troops Dispatched To Maintain Order!

Lines are swelling at Venezuelan supermarkets, with some shoppers showing up before dawn in search of products ranging from chicken to laun...

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No Drinking Water In Venezuela Until Bankers Get Paid Back

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <div style="line-height: 17.33333396911621px; margin-bottom: 0.75em; margin-top: 0.25em;"> <span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">2013 was a good year for Goldman Sachs investments in Emerging Markets, <a href="http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-01-30/how-glorious-socialist-revolution-generated-681-return-goldman-sachs" style="text-decoration: none;">most notably Venezuelan bonds (as they bet on socialism and won)</a>. A year later and Goldman's EM debt portfolio is still loaded with Venezuelan bonds... and the arrears are mounting. As Bloomberg reports, at a time when<strong> Venezuela’s record $25 billion in arrears to importers has its citizens waiting hours in line to buy drinking water and crossing borders in search of medicine, President Nicolas Maduro is using the nation’s dwindling supply of dollars to enrich bondholders</strong>.</span></div> <div style="line-height: 17.33333396911621px; margin-bottom: 0.75em; margin-top: 0.25em;"> <img src="http://www.bloomberg.com/image/icOBeqd3aaDc.jpg"></div> </div>

No Drinking Water In Venezuela Until Bankers Get Paid Back

2013 was a good year for Goldman Sachs investments in Emerging Markets,  most notably Venezuelan bonds (as they bet on socialism and won) ...

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Food Rationing Restricts Families To Shopping Once A Week In Venezuela

<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Venezuelans queued on Friday to register for an electronic card system designed to end food shortages that have plagued the country – but which some fear may be the thin end of the rationing wedge.<br><br>The ID card, introduced this week, will limit Venezuelans to once-a-week shopping and will set off an alarm to halt any transaction if a purchaser breaks the rules. The government wants to prevent individual shoppers from “over-buying” in a country hit by acute shortages of basic items including milk, sugar and toilet paper. Critics say it is an admission of failure of economic policy in one of the world’s big oil-producing nations.</span><br> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br></span> <img alt="food" src="http://survivalbackpack.us/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/food.jpg"><br>

Food Rationing Restricts Families To Shopping Once A Week In Venezuela

Venezuelans queued on Friday to register for an electronic card system designed to end food shortages that have plagued the country – but wh...

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