Venezuela introduces Cuba-like food card

September 6, 2010 10:48


Presented by President Hugo Chávez as an instrument to make shopping for groceries easier, the “Good Life Card” is making various segments of the population wary because they see it as a furtive attempt to introduce a rationing card similar to the one in Cuba.

BY ANTONIO MARIA DELGADO at Miami Herald

EXCERPTS:

‘”We see that in short-term this could become a rationing card probably similar to the one used in Cuba,” Roberto León Parilli, president of the National Association of Users and Consumers, told El Nuevo Herald. “It would use more advanced technological means [than those used in Cuba], but when they tell you where to buy and what the limits of what you can buy are, they are conditioning your purchases.”’

‘Yet, critics pointed out that the measure could turn out not as innocent as the minister makes it to be, and they insist that the government control over the supply chain is too broad and depends greatly on imports the government authorizes through its currency exchange system.’

FULL STORY



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