Crystal Ball
New York Times today...
May 17, 2007
Clash of Hope and Fear as Venezuela Seizes Land
By SIMON ROMERO
URACHICHE, Venezuela — The squatters arrive before dawn with machetes and rifles, surround the well-ordered rows of sugar cane and threaten to kill anyone who interferes. Then they light a match to the crops and declare the land their own.
For centuries, much of Venezuela’s rich farmland has been in the hands of a small elite. After coming to power in 1998, and especially after his re-election in December, President Hugo Chávez vowed to end that inequality, and has been keeping his promise in a process that is both brutal and legal.
Mr. Chávez is carrying out what may become the largest forced land redistribution in Venezuela’s history, building utopian farming villages for squatters, lavishing money on new cooperatives and sending army commando units to supervise seized estates in six states.
Mike Ceaser in Latin Trade, December 2005...
The Plot Thickens
Venezuela seizes private ranches and gives them to the poor, which has businesses—and environmentalists—worried
Anthony Richards' business card describes him as the "administrator" of Hato Charcote, a 5,220-hectare ranch of plains, woods and wetlands in central Venezuela, where thousands of cattle are fattened to become steaks and hamburgers. But seated in his small office at the ranch's entrance, Richards' exasperated tone makes it clear he's administrating less and less these days.
"It isn't easy living surrounded by people who don't like you," the British-born Richards says of the hundreds of government-backed campesinos, landless peasants who have squatted property on Charcote and now claim nearly all of it. Richards accuses the campesinos of shooting cattle, setting fires and cutting down trees.
May 17, 2007
Clash of Hope and Fear as Venezuela Seizes Land
By SIMON ROMERO
URACHICHE, Venezuela — The squatters arrive before dawn with machetes and rifles, surround the well-ordered rows of sugar cane and threaten to kill anyone who interferes. Then they light a match to the crops and declare the land their own.
For centuries, much of Venezuela’s rich farmland has been in the hands of a small elite. After coming to power in 1998, and especially after his re-election in December, President Hugo Chávez vowed to end that inequality, and has been keeping his promise in a process that is both brutal and legal.
Mr. Chávez is carrying out what may become the largest forced land redistribution in Venezuela’s history, building utopian farming villages for squatters, lavishing money on new cooperatives and sending army commando units to supervise seized estates in six states.
Mike Ceaser in Latin Trade, December 2005...
The Plot Thickens
Venezuela seizes private ranches and gives them to the poor, which has businesses—and environmentalists—worried
Anthony Richards' business card describes him as the "administrator" of Hato Charcote, a 5,220-hectare ranch of plains, woods and wetlands in central Venezuela, where thousands of cattle are fattened to become steaks and hamburgers. But seated in his small office at the ranch's entrance, Richards' exasperated tone makes it clear he's administrating less and less these days.
"It isn't easy living surrounded by people who don't like you," the British-born Richards says of the hundreds of government-backed campesinos, landless peasants who have squatted property on Charcote and now claim nearly all of it. Richards accuses the campesinos of shooting cattle, setting fires and cutting down trees.
posted by Greg Brown at 11:20 AM
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