Venezuela may repay World Bank, IADB debt in 2006

Venezuela may repay World Bank, IADB debt in 2006
Tue Dec 27, 2005 2:07 PM ET

CARACAS, Venezuela, Dec 27 (Reuters) - Venezuela may repay its debt in full to international institutions such as World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank next year, a senior legislator said.

State news agency ABN quoted Rodrigo Cabezas, president of the National Assembly's finance commission, as saying late on Monday an expected balance of payments surplus of $3 billion this year and $4 billion projected for next year should allow the country to pay all its debt to the lenders.

Venezuela owes around $3 billion to the World Bank, the IADB and the Caracas-based multilateral Andean Development Corp. (CAF), another lender that Venezuela should pay in full, according to Cabezas.

He said there should also be enough resources to refinance domestic debt and repurchase some of the foreign debt.
(snip/...)

http://today.reuters.com/investing/financeArticle.aspx?type=bondsNews&storyID=2005-12-27T190641Z_01_N27331822_RTRIDST_0_FINANCIAL-VENEZUELA-DEBT.XML

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Kinda makes you wonder where the money was going BEFORE Venezuelans elected Hugo Chavez. It surely wasn't going to help the poor, or improve the country's economy. That's why there have been so many people clinging to the sides of mountains for such a long time.

kinda shuts-up those that claim he's just lining his own pockets.

I am sure we will be trying to set up some kind of assassination.

providing low cost or free heating oil to the poor in at least 2 US states. It seems mean-spirited to blame Venezuela for "expensive oil' or the "Iraq war" (if that's what you mean), when they are using their oil profits for the common good, to put Venezuela's economy in the black, and create schools, medical clinics and provide small business funding for Venezuela's vast poor population, which has never before been served by government.

Just a word to the wise.

deleted

Now that they are on the verge of liquidating their debit, they can spend their resources on economic growth, education. Not to mention not having to deal with international bureaucrats who don't like Chavez!

In full.

Che's dream is alive. A sustainable, united Latin America, is within reach.

electing leftist governments in proportion to their support in the population, forming their own political and economic alliances, serving their own people, pushing US-based global corporate predators out (Bechtel in Bolivia), and setting an example for responsible self-rule to the whole world. What's happening in South America--basically, the whole map of the subcontinent going "blue" (Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Venezuela, and now, Bolivia)--puts us to shame. WE are the "banana republic" now!

Time to invite the OAS, the EU election groups and the Carter Center to help us set up real elections in the U.S.

think they are going red ;)

And to think that we have morans in this country that want to see Chavez overthrown. We could learn a lot from Venezuela and its leaders....

his ilk?

...elections. Just imagine a country where all the wealth isn't siphoned off to the rich elite and global corporate predators. It's refreshing to think of--especially with the US poor and vanishing middle class now saddled with a trillion dollar deficit over the next decade to pay for Bush Jr.'s slaughter of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis, and the torture of others. Think we can get the Bush Cartel to pay off our debt to our Chinese note-holders?

It's no wonder they took away our right to vote. I'd be afraid of us, too, if I'd done what they've done to the "land of the free and the home of the brave."

-------

Throw Diebold and ES&S election theft machines into 'Boston Harbor' NOW!

election insurance!

Concerning Americans using 40% cheaper Venezuelan oil this winter, Democratic Congressman Richard Serrano just got the first shipment delivered to the Bronx a week or two ago! Beautiful sight in photos taken of a big tanker truck arriving with the first oil.

Also, news in the last day or so that Delaware, with a Republican governor, if I'm not mistaken, just got on board, as well. This will REALLY steam some of the less "compassionate" MEpublicans.

he's figured out what's really going on here--that we, too, are oppressed. It must be hard for people in countries that our government and our global corporate predators have so brutally exploited and repressed, to grasp the divide between the US gov't and its people. Most people, if anything, get corporate TV versions of us--looking very prosperous and often acting like callous, egocentric idiots. The real people here--the vast majority of peace-loving, justice-loving, progressive Americans, in the poor and middle class, who have no voice or presence in the corporate news monopolies, and which are now getting squeezed to death by Bush war profiteer debt, Bush oil company price gouging, Bush Enron thieves, and other wildly out of control corporate sharks--must be hard for people in other countries to perceive. I was incredibly impressed with Chavez when he started speaking of the U.S. poor. THAT takes intelligence, and feeling, and an effort to know the truth.

They are the 3rd largest supplier of US crude.

Chavez talks a lot but does take our money, by the billions.

If (when) oil cycles back down to $30 a bbl that will cause them a problem.

Massachusetts, New York State, Deleware, the Gulf Coast, and Native American reservations.

They are surely not trying to rip off our country's neediest.

It means they can afford to give away product at a 40% discount, for kindness, or political reasons.

This board has lots of threads on South America. So I'm reading up. Interesting topics.

However, oil is a commodity and the sole reason they can afford to do this and support social programs. When it cycles down they could have problems. Oil is artificially high thanks to enron like speculation.

Unlike western europe or japan (etc) South American economies are MOSTLY based on agri or commodity export. When the price of these fall their economies suffer.

Ha! If anything, oil is artificially low thanks to the fact that our tax dollars (rather than the price of oil) supports our military endeavors to practically steal oil from the rest of the world. Think how high oil would be if it truly reflected those costs.

And that leaves out the entire set of facts that point to the world running out of easily recovered oil.

I'm pretty sure our war in iraq has cut their output..

Sunday, December 18, 2005
Indians Talk To Venezuela About Tribal Low-Cost Heating

Submitted by Sunshine Woman Archambault
Center For Civic Participation
sunshine@ccp.org

BOSTON - The planned delivery of low-cost heating oil from Venezuela's CITGO Petroleum Corp. to Massachusetts and New York state is under way, while American Indians continue talks with CITGO to bring low-cost heating oil and gasoline to tribes.

American Indian activist Robert Free Galvan, who is organizing efforts with CITGO, said Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is demonstrating to the world that there is another way to engage in the sale of oil and gas.

''CITGO holds very highly their corporate social responsibility and vision; it is an example for tribal corporations to follow,'' Galvan said. ''The recent oil crisis profited billions to oil companies, but which ones have offered communities anything - besides CITGO?''

American Indian tribes throughout the United States, including tribes in Arizona, Nevada and South Dakota, contacted Galvan concerning Chavez's offer of low-cost gasoline and heating oil after Venezuela made the offer earlier this year.

A representative of the Walker River Paiute Tribe in Nevada, Tribal Operations Director Dan Brannum, and Galvan recently met with CITGO and Venezuela's consulate officials in Chicago to begin working toward deliveries to Indian communities.
(snip/...)

http://nativeunity.blogspot.com/

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Thank God the groups decided to look into this, like the Democratic Congressmen in the New England states. Big, BIG help.

Damn right, Pavulon. And it is about time.

Venezuela has every right to profit from their national resources. Can't fault a man for taking care of business, to the benefit of his people.

It wasn't always that way ...

I think it is funny that he talks so much shit about bush and the US but makes billions through his boys in Texas. Citgo made Pllennty of cash, enough to give away a little product to make the news.

My point is that when the single commodity paying for all this drops a reaction could happen.

to the U.S., and how much profit the distributors make.

I don't know myself, but I do know that in this country, falls in the
price of crude are seldom passed on to consumers. I wouldn't mind
betting the same thing happens in the U.S.

what the market will bear. You are right when crude was at $12 a bbl gas was not 1/4 of what it is now.

build up value-adding businesses, like airplane body manufacturing.

They also have incredible agricultural resources, which began to be ignored in the early part of the 20th century when oil started getting all the attention.

they grow alot of oranges in the Valencia area and the coffee is superb. Still with their overreliance on the oil industry, they are no where near as established in the agricultural sector as Colombia or Brazil.

with Chavez.

They have an agricultural policy.

One of the primary political motivations of the Chavez government is to reallocate resources to rectify the problems that resulted when previous government abandoned agriculture to focus all resources on oil.

If this really is a serious concern of yours than you should really like Chavez's government. They have targeted this problem as one of the major concerns and for the first time since the 1920s they are taking this issue seriously and are doing things to fix the problem.

it has a long way to go. again, the oil industry rules.

of the small revenue derived from agriculture, 50% of the revenue from agriculture is through cattle ranching. the ranches that are targeted for "expropriation".

http://www.latin-focus.com/latinfocus/factsheets/venezuela/venfact_sectors_agriculture.htm

Do you expect change to happen overnight?

For the first time in 80 years they have a government concerned with diversifying the economy and building a strong base of working people.

Trend lines, my friend -- they're obviously moving in the right direction in Venezuela. You can't deny this.

so when is that going to happen? when Venezuela economy boomed in the 70s ( I said 80s before) agriculture was all but abandoned. Why?? because people could earn more and get a job easily in the oil industry. the same is happening now. its going to be hard to convince people to farm when they can get a job in the oil or mineral industry.

Venezuela has great potential agriculturally but it has not been developed.

question: have you ever been there??

By the way, did you know that, thanks to low royalty rates negotiated by corrupt governments, and thanks to IMF debt, VZ was almost bankrupt until a couple months after the end of the management-led oil strikes in 2003?

Negotiating higher royalty rates and retiring debt are keep steps in securing the revenue to invest in public-works programs that will return their investment.

By the way, did you know that, thanks to low royalty rates negotiated by corrupt governments, and thanks to IMF debt, VZ was almost bankrupt until a couple months after the end of the management-led oil strikes in 2003?

Negotiating higher royalty rates and retiring debt are keep steps in securing the revenue to invest in public-works programs that will return their investment.

It's what he DOES with that money that separates him from the oil fatcats.

Your point that fluctuating prices change scenarios is pretty obvious.

That's why paying off your debts, WHEN YOU HAVE A SURPLUS, makes a ton of sense. Oil will eventually drop, but when it does, Venezuela won't have any debt to re-pay. This is what smart governments do. They pay off their debts, so that their people and their resources don't get exploited.

Ain't gonna happen. Ever again.

Now, back to our thread...


<<How to empty a crowded room in thirty seconds: mention "Peak Oil">>

That is the only outlet for Venezuelan fuel products in the USA. Venezuela has been running a surplus ever since Chavez first got elected. He was reelected by a landslide.....

Bolivia with 55% of the vote in a field of eight--the biggest presidential victory in their history under fair elections. He campaigned with a wreath of pure coca leaves around his neck, has vowed to end the murderous, US-led "war on drugs," and described himself as "the United States' worst nightmare." Now that takes guts!

Viva Morales!

Tell me again why our economic system is so great.

the US doesn't have a 70% poverty rate or nearly completely dependent on one industry??

In Venezuela, last time there was an oil boom, poverty worsened, so it's not JUST oil prices that are helping in Venezuela.

In Venezuela, inflation is down, GNP increasing, wealth distribution improving, employment is up, wages are up, literacy is up, access to health care has improved greatly, and poverty is decreasing.

Venezuela is not a one-industry nation. Venezuela has great agricultural resources that were abandoned when oil was discovered. One of Chavez's major goals is to rectify the the country-city divide that was caused by earlier governments' 100% focus on the oil industry. They're building railroads out to the country side, and they have a very determined agricultural policy. Venezuela also has a lot of aluminum. The government is also determined to build private industries which add value to that natural resource.

Compare all that to the US, where we're moving closer to the abyss on every measure. Hunger is up, poverty is up, polarization of wealth is up. If any country has a single industry, it is the US, and that industry is consumer debt and the consequent middle and working class misery.

and then crashed when oil prices fell. Venezuela is overly dependent on the oil industry. the increase in oil prices coincides with the improvement in Venezuela's economy. Hello!!!!!

yes, I know Venezuela has agricultural potential, however, with the oil noone wants to be a farmer and it has been effectively abandoned.

Ok, lets compare to the US. the US does not have a 70% poverty rate. the average income for a family is about 10 times what it is in Venezuela. the unemployment rate is at 5%. the US economy is very diverse that is why it is not prone to fluctuations like Venezuela's.

At the same time oil prices were going up, most of that wealth was being siphoned off to the very wealthy. It did very little for the rest of society. Also, the Chicago School economists were convincing Venezuela to take on incredible debt that wasn't being spent usefully, was also contributiing to the polarization of wealth and power, and was creating huge burdens for the budget.

Read Richard Gott's book on Venezuela.

As for the US vs VZ: the snapshot makes things look good in the US, but you can't deny that the motion picture tells a much different story. Do you deny that the trend lines are going in opposite directions?

until this past year poverty increased under Chavez as well. The windfall from the oil revenue has begun to reverse that trend.

Venezuela is largely dependent on oil. until that changes they will be subject to economic fluctuations.

hey, I agree with you. venezuela needs to diversify its economy.

Actually, the US economic indicators in the US have been quite good over the past year.

4% growth. I see both the US and Venezuela as improving. However there is NO comparison between a third world country like Ven and the US economically.

because it doesn't explain how wealth is being distibuted.

I was going to mention this above in my post with that string of improving indicators for Venezuela. GNP is the least important. Wealth distribution, employment, poverty, hunger, wages, literacy, health, and well-being are the best indicators of the health of nations. Having said that, GNP in VZ is improving, but along with improvement by all those other measures, which has not been the case in VZ in the past, and is not the case in the US today.

If you think the US economy is doing well because of a 4% increase in GNP, I have a slate of Republican 2006 candidates I'd like to sell you.

And back to my other, larger, point: trend lines. You have to admit that the trend lines are going in opposite directions in VZ and the US.

if they have a 70% poverty rate then their wealth distribution is not very good now is it??

wages in Venezuela are very low. their per capita is about $3000

I do not believe that the US is doing too bad economically. Anyone would take a 4% sustained growth rate. The deficit is more problematic.

poverty, increasing hunger, and increasing misery among the middle and working class, with increasing hours worked, decreasing opportunity, increasing costs for education, decreasing savings, and increasing debt?

Count me on the side of Sen, Galbraith and Stiglitz when it comes to understanding the direction economies like the US's and Venezuela's are moving.

You've picked an odd forum on which to be a proponent of the idea that anti-Keynesian economic policies in the US are moving things in a good direction, while Keynesian economic policies in Venezuela are something of which to be suspicious.

let me put it to you this way. I lived in latin america for a long time. I have seen abject poverty first hand. much worse than what Judy showed in those propaganda pics.

The US is NOT suffering actually, comparitively, or by any other measure if you have really seen poverty.

The US has the problem of being too fat!! That is not the result of poverty or starvation.

So yes indeed, by any measure of the imagination, except those with extremely limited experience, I shed no tear for the "condition" of the United States.

nomic policies are leading us?

You don't see that people who work for a living are dramatically losing all kinds of economic and political power? You don't see that the polarization of power that is underway already, and has already reached extreme levels, is going to take us off the edge of the cliff, the same way it did during the Great Depression (with no FDR in sight to rescue us this time)?

OK.

Wake me up when your dream is over.

What do you do for a living?

What kind of people are in your social circle?

I have a diverse group of friends. an overseas experience tends to promote that. I live somewhere in the South which reflects my more moderate views than others who post here.

A candidate like say Wesley Clark, John Edwards, or Mark Warner would be to my liking more so than say Dennis Kucinic, Howard Dean, or Al Sharpton

stagnating wages for people devoting more time to less satisfying work where you live?

You don't see the direction that America's current anti-Keynesian economic policies are taking us?

the South is more laid back though.

I haven't seen any 5 year old dirty indigenous girls with an infant on her back begging for food in a major city in the US though.

I have seen obese people in the supermarket checkout lines buying soft drinks, cheetos, and potato chips with food stamps though.

est of junk foods, often because you don't have the economic and cultural power to aquire better information than the lies you're fed by a society taken over by the sellers -- yes, all good signs. Good times. Let 'em roll.

Of course those people in the US supermarket lines are a little better off -- meausred in absolute terms only (see below) -- than the people in developing countries whose misery is caused by the exploitation that helps to polarize wealth within the US and between nations, but, hey, whatever. At least their misery gives us the opportunity to complain about people like Judy who have the gall to argue that a country engaged in more progressive (Keynesian) economic policies than the US might be on the right track.

I have another book for you: The Health of Nations. IIIR, it points out that an average black man in Harlem, in NYC, may have a higher income than someone living in a more egalitarian developing economy, however, he has a significantly shorter life span. How can he be better off when his relative poverty is making his life shorter and more miserable?

and are content to sit around on your ass and stuff your face while watching Desperate Housewives.

Sorry, I don't feel sorry for these people and I do not consider them "poor". Poor decision makers maybe.

but that is from my perspective, having lived a long time in another region of world where hunger and poverty are real and life threatening.

and poverty.

it might challenge some of your presumptions about the state of the US economy and the causes of what you witnessed overseas.

*sigh*

even people with jobs who make enough to sustain themselves.

alot of it has to do with the lifestyle people choose though. consumerism and materialism drains ones financial resources rather than investing in important things like education, retirement, family, health care. Not to mention the strain on the environment caused by American's and others as well, incessant demands for material goods.

were going with it.

one thing that the United States certainly doesn't lack in is food production.

Is that those poor indigenous people are living that way because of the policies that the US and the Latin American elites have been doing to them. It's time to try something else which is what Mr Chavez is doing.

that was just an example. and you have misconstrued what I have been saying. but I tend to blame the centuries old failures on the unbroken line of corrupt governments in latin america more so than the US.

I don't trust politicians and believe they are more interested in power than any underlying desire to truly help their citizens.

that being said, I support Chavez's programs for the poor including health care and education. I do not support his heavy handed oppressive measures on freedom of speech or the seizure of private property with paratroopers.

So what? Neither do most people. Being that, there are so few decent ones. People will notice the ones that do seem to be interested in actual change. You just seem to have a hard on for this guy since day one. Freedom of speech my ass. The media openly lies about him. They even had an "expert" on to explain that Mr Chavez has a sexual thing for Mr. Castro. Try getting away with that here.

People are free to say whatever they want. Of all the people I know from Ven. pro or con Chavez. Nobody feels oppressed and talk openly about what's going on.

supermarkets, Judy is not allowed to make a graphic argument that Keynesian economic policies (which are very different from what we're doing in the US) might alleviate poverty in Venezuela.

I don't happen to agree with her that Chavez is the savior though.

but I did find it kind of amusing the pics she posted though and how she described the "awful" poverty.

to me the pics showed people in a very dignified manner which is good. albeit its propaganda. but it certainly didn't capture the abject poverty of alot of Venezuela or latin america. I didn't think the pics showed real poverty at all. Some crappy houses maybe.

but its from her perspective.

characterize their enthusiasm for good policies in exaggerated religious terms.

n/t

n/t

I know a guy though whose wife was Venezuelan. She dumped him and he became a rabid Chavez supporter. Why?? because she hated Chavez.

he lived there too. Lived in the Maracaibo area for 6 years and did not learn a lick of Spanish and lived in a wealthy area.

Now he is back in the States, a rabid Chavez supporter and advocate for the poor.

How sweet!!

He was also a Clark suporter and had some kind of fixation with Mr Chavez. Kind of like the opposite of your friend.

n/t

to talk shit about everybody here and even ended up voting for Pres. Bunnypants.

He would always brag (and I mean always) about how much Spanish he spoke. He really wasn't that good at it turns out.

I can't say that I've missed him either. Hope he isn't back.

the hills, and any fire can burn them all down, since there's no room to bring up fire trucks, etc., etc.

Their houses are built on poorly poured concrete slabs which seperate, creating actual "split level" houses, meaning houses ripped apart. Their roofs are tin.



In the meantime, most of the land in the country is owned by a very, very few of the oligarchy, who own enormous ranches, much of that land simply lying unused, while the poor eke out their existances in these tiny, dangerous houses.

This seems to be just fine as far as the elite of Venezuela go. It has been that way forever, and they fought like demons to keep this President from being elected, and staying in office. They look down on the poor, just as the right-wing does here, imagining them to simply be lazy, and stupid. They don't mind sharing their insulting "observations" with journalists who interview them.

Here's a slideshow of more of Venezuela's desperately poor people's living conditions:

http://www.salonchingon.com/exhibits/caracas2004/index2.html

repaid its debt, even that incurred by Maximillan.
Europe repaid its Marshall Plan debt which was legit.
I really wonder if World Bank or Inter-American are legit, since part is given to crooked politicians as bribes, the county is obliged to use American contractors, e.g. Iraq and Haliburton when the Iraqis could do the rebuilding themselves, etc., then the countries pay interest on monies that really don't help the country. It is a racket. If Venezuela pays debt incurred bt RWs then the U$A has no excuse to invade or anything else.

:sarcasm:

American Indian activist Robert Free Galvan, who is organizing efforts with CITGO, said Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is demonstrating to the world that there is another way to engage in the sale of oil and gas.

''CITGO holds very highly their corporate social responsibility and vision; it is an example for tribal corporations to follow,'' Galvan said. ''The recent oil crisis profited billions to oil companies, but which ones have offered communities anything - besides CITGO?''

Well I nevah heard such talk...corporate social responsibility?
Who the hell are these people?:sarcasm:

Sad state of affairs when this guy's actions are still considered suspect around HERE.

Look in Poppy's bank account.