Edited by Tasmiyah Randeree
I was in an economics lecture the other day. It was business as usual with the professor talking about financial crises and money but when the topic turned towards Venezuela I paid more attention. The professor mentioned how the Venezuelan currency has been greatly devaluated so much so that it has established a new record. In response, everybody started laughing. At that moment, I realized that people don’t actually know or perhaps even care about what is happening in Venezuela right now and how heartbreaking it is.
For that reason, I decided to pinpoint some facts on what is happening and how it is affecting not only Venezuelans but other Latin American populations too.
Venezuela has experienced the greatest downfall of living-standards ever seen in Latin America.
Though Venezuela is one of the richest countries in Latin America (and for that matter in the world), it has experienced one of the worst downfalls in living standards. From being one of the fastest growing countries, Venezuela is now a place where basic needs such as water and food are missing every day.
GDP per capita is close to Iran and Syria’s (decreasing, day by day)
Income per capita, which is the fancy way of saying “per person”, has declined by almost 40% every year, making it impossible for politicians to get the country out of its economic crisis.
On Monday a kilo of peaches costs about 1.1 million bolivares. A month from now it will probably cost 2.2 million.
Currently, it takes approximately 19 days for prices to duplicate. Venezuela has an inflation rate of 1.300.000% per year. That means that toilet paper would cost approximately 2.600 million.
9 out of 10 people cannot afford food, daily.
3 out of 4 people suffer from involuntary weight loss due to lack of food availability and financial capacity to pay for it. The average weight loss per person is of 8.6 kg until 2016.
This is not even half of what is actually going on right now. Venezuela is a beautiful country with people who deserve better than the challenges they are experiencing right now. Its easy to turn a population into numbers on a sheet but a country’s economic crisis is no laughing matter when lives are being affected. Venezuelans around the world hope the country will be able to get back to what it once was.
Sources: Source 1 / Source 2 / Source 3 / Source 4 / Source 5