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Background
VenezuelaSpanish:Venezuelaofficially
the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela,
is a country on the northern coast of South America.
Comprising a continental mainland and numerous
islands in the Caribbean Sea, Venezuela borders
Guyana to the east, Brazil to the south, and
Colombia to the west. Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados,
Curaçao, Bonaire, Aruba, and the Leeward
Antilles lie just north of the Venezuelan coast.
A former Spanish colony, Venezuela
is a federal republic. Historically, Venezuela
has had territorial disputes with Guyana, largely
concerning the Essequibo area, and with Colombia
concerning the Gulf of Venezuela. Today, Venezuela
is known widely for its petroleum industry, the
environmental diversity of its territory, and
its natural features. Christopher Columbus, upon
seeing its eastern coast in 1498, referred to
Venezuela as "Tierra de Gracia" ("Land
of Grace"), which has become the country’s
nickname.
Venezuela is among the most urbanized
countries in Latin America; the vast majority
of Venezuelans live in the cities of the north,
especially in the largest metropolis, Caracas.
Other major cities include Maracaibo, Barquisimeto,
Valencia, Maracay, and Ciudad Guaya
Politics
The Venezuelan president is
elected by vote, with direct and universal suffrage,
and functions as both head of state and head
of government. The term of office is six years,
and a president may be re-elected to a single
consecutive term. The president appoints the
vice-president and decides the size and composition
of the cabinet and makes appointments to it with
the involvement of the legislature. The president
can ask the legislature to reconsider portions
of laws he finds objectionable, but a simple
parliamentary majority can override these objections.
The unicameral Venezuelan parliament
is the National Assembly or Asamblea Nacional.
Its 167 deputies, of which three are reserved for
indigenous people, serve five-year terms and may
be re-elected for a maximum of two additional terms.
They are elected by popular vote through a combination
of party lists and single member constituencies.
The highest judicial body is the Supreme Tribunal
of Justice or Tribunal Supremo de Justicia,
whose magistrates are elected by parliament for
a single twelve-year term.
Economic overview
The petroleum sector dominates Venezuela's
mixed economy, accounting for approximately a third
of the GDP, around 80% of export earnings, and
more than half of government revenues. The country's
main petroleum deposits are located around and
beneath the large fresh-water Lake Maracaibo connected
to the Gulf of Venezuela from the north by a tidal
channel and fed by the Catatumbo, Santa Ana and
Chama rivers. Oil tankers enter the lake through
the tidal channel which was dredged in 1956 to
accommodate the ships.
The oil sector operates through the
government-owned Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA),
which among other things owns the US-based distributor CITGO and
its more than 14,000 retail gasoline outlets. Venezuela
is the United States' largest foreign supplier
of oil.
As of 2007, 37% of the population
lives in poverty; the unemployment rate stands
at 8.4%.
Venezuela is also highly dependent
on its agricultural sector. Sectors with major
potential for export-led growth are production
of both coffee and cocoa crops. At one time, Venezuela
ranked close to Colombia in coffee production,
but in the 1960s and 1970s, as petroleum temporarily
turned Venezuela into the richest country in South
America, coffee was relegated to the economic back
burner. Today, Venezuela produces less than 1%
of the world's coffee, most of it consumed by the
domestic market. However, Venezuelan coffees are
again entering the North American specialty markets.
Venezuela's cocoa industry has decayed since the
days of Spanish colonialism, when African slaves
worked on cocoa estates. The focus of cocoa cultivation
has long since moved to tropical West Africa. In
recent years, there has been an attempt to resuscitate
this industry, as its rare variety of cacao, known
as Chuao, is considered the finest and most
aromatic in the world and is used in certain single-origin
chocolates. The largest Venezuelan fine chocolate
producer is El Rey, though some companies
such as Savoy (Nestlé) also manufacture
chocolate from Venezuelan cacao and export it to
Europe.
Venezuela is one of the five founding
members of OPEC, the international oil cartel.
Through the initiative of Juan Pablo Pérez
Alfonzo, OPEC was proposed in 1960 as a response
to low domestic and international oil prices. Since
2005, Venezuela has been a member of Mercosur,
joining Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay;
it has yet to gain voting rights. Venezuela is
also a member of the South American Community of
Nations (SACN).
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