Bolivarian Government of Venezuela
Ministry of People’s Power for Foreign Affairs Office of The Deputy Minister for Africa
Embassy of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela in Kenya Concurrent to Rwanda, Uganda, Tanzania and Somalia
Permanent Mission of Venezuela to the United Nations Environment programme (UNEP)and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (ONU Habitat).
weeklynewsletter VOL. 1 8th JUNE 2015 ISSUE. 11
Menendez at UN: Venezuela has kept all social rights amidst an economic war Despite the aggression against the currency, funding sources and supply, and the decrease of revenues, in Venezuela have been kept intact all social rights, said the Vice President for Planning and Knowledge, Ricardo Menendez, from Geneva, Switzerland. As part of the participation of the representative of the Bolivarian Government in the session of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of the Organization for the United Nations (UN) he stressed that in Venezuela have not been sacrificed the social rights, and therein lies the great equation to keep the vision of development. One of the biggest questions that has emerged in this meeting -by part of the participating countries- is how Venezuela has managed to resist these years amidst an adverse scenario, how it was possible to maintain the social indicators with a decrease of 60 percent of oil revenues in the country.
What’s Inside! 1. Menendez at UN: Venezuela has kept all social rights amidst an economic war
He noted that although in recent years there has been a decrease in unemployment, a reduction of extreme poverty, have increased indicators linked to internet penetration, the use of computers and the expansion of the education system, it has been tried to impose on the international scenario a matrix on the alleged stagnation or regression of the values in Venezuela. In contrast to the scenario of stagnation that is wanted to draw on Venezuela, he noted that over the past 16 years have been created 42 new universities, 13 of these inaugurated by President Nicolas Maduro, added to the 220,000 new professionals who graduate annually from the different study houses of the country. www.rnv.gob.ve
2. Defending human rights is a permanent policy of Venezuela 3. Venezuela's oil minister: OPEC will continue to promote market stabilization 4. FAO acknowledges Venezuela for a second time
Defending human rights is a permanent policy of Venezuela Caracas, 05 Jun. AVN.For the Venezuelan government, defending and guaranteeing human rights of the population is part of a comprehensive and permanent state policy, even conceived within the Constitution. "For Venezuela defending human rights is not a temporary or accommodative matter, but a part of a continuous development, not in compliance with a governance, but with a revolutionary process to transform society, and even is subject of a full title in the Constitution," said Thursday Vice President for Planning and Knowledge, Ricardo Menendez, in statements given to the Venezuelan News Agency (AVN). He recalled that the Constitution devotes Title III to guarantee the human rights of all Venezuelans, and added that the Constitution is one of the few in the world that provides the guarantee not only of political and social rights, but also of indigenous communities, cultural and economic. "We are one of the few nations with a Constitution which develops this conception of human rights in a comprehensive manner," said Menendez, who on Tuesday presented to the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of the United Nations Organization (UN) in Geneva, the social achievements in Venezuela in the past 16 years. In this regard, he said that the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights created by the UN is conceived by the Venezuelan government as an integral doctrine."For Venezuela it has constitutional status, it is conceived within the Plan of the Nation, and in the everyday actions of our Bolivarian government," he said.
statistical data collected strictly by the National Statistics Institute (INE) and government agencies. "We do not project data, we collect the data," said Menendez. During his speech, which lasted more than 2 hours, the Venezuelan delegation answered 91 questions and detailed the achievements won by the people under the Bolivarian Revolution in the last 16 years, taking into consideration the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. "In each of the articles we almost have a treaty of complete gains. For example, the first article of the international covenant defines the importance of sovereignty and self-determination, and indeed we have rescued our natural resources to make a fair distribution of revenues from oil exports among the population," he said.Thus, he reported that from 1999-2014, the revolutionary government has earmarked 732 billion dollars for social investment, representing 62% of national income, and recalled that in the period 1984-1998 only 80 billion dollars were spent in social policies, that is, 36% of national income, and recalled that the governments of the time considered resources as a "cost" and not as an investment.
The Planning Minister also explained that during the presentation at the UN, the Venezuelan delegation made a breakdown of each of the articles under the international agreement and the achievements in this area.
The Vice President for Planning and Knowledge said that as part of the social investment in Revolution, Venezuelan households has doubled consumption, while the oil consumption within the country went from 458 million barrels/day to 703 million in the last 16 years.
He said that the presentation and responses to questions posed by members of the committee on policies and plans implemented by the State to guarantee social rights to the population, were based on
In addition, between 1997 and 2013, there was an increase of 177% in the number of subscribers in
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fixed telephony, 2,701% in mobile telephony, 2,142% in Internet service and 3,932% in Internet users. Furthermore, consumption of electricity rose from2,458 kilowatt hours (kwh) per person to 3,313 kwh between 1989 and 2011. Creating more than 4.6 million jobs Menendez also stressed that the Venezuelan delegation stated at the UN that Venezuelan unemployment dropped from 15% in 1999 to 5.5% in 2014, thanks to the creation of 4,626,867 jobs.Likewise, he said that in the 90s, formal employment reached 45%, while currently it surpasses 60%. He specified that, according to the census conducted in 2001, there were one million professionals in Venezuela; however, with the massification of education and the opening of new universities under Revolution there are now 2,800 thousand professionals in several areas. "We have grown by 1.8 times, that gives a clear signal of an authentic revolution, a turning point in the series," he said. Structural poverty reached 5.4%, the lowest rate in Venezuelan history. "In any circumstances, including economic war, guarimba (violen riots), oil sabotage and coup attempt, the revolution fully always guaranteed income of minimum wage is higher than the cost of the food basket," he said. Menendez explained that Venezuela has the lowest Gini index in Latin America: 0.38. This indicator is used to measure inequality in the distribution of income in income distribution, and when its value is closer to zero, it means a higher level of equality. Similarly, he reported that the income gap between the richest 20% and poorest 20% declined by 5.7 times. Social Security Menendez also said that the Revolutionary Government continues to guarantee the right to social security by granting pensions, so in Venezuela there are now 10 times more pensioners than 20 years ago, while he pointed out that there were only 234,300 pensioners in 1990, while 2,565,725 were reported in 2014. He stressed that this year it will be added 300,000 new pensioners that will be paid an amount equivalent to minimum wage. "In just one year, deliveries of pension surpassed that of 1990."
In education, the attendance of people aged 3-16 increased from 84% to 91% in the last 16 years of revolution, while 1,759,250 people were taught to read by the Mission Robinson. He praised the mass application and democratization of information and communication technologies with initiatives such as the Education Project Canaima, a policy launched in 2008 that has materialized free delivery of mini laptops to over 3.7 million students of primary and high school education and 600 thousand university students. He also spoke about the impact of the Great Housing Mission Venezuela, created in 2011 by Commander of the Revolution, Hugo Chavez, and to date has built more than 700 thousand proper housing units. "It's a paradigm shift, since currently 10% of total households that exist in Venezuela were built by this mission, and we have projected that by 2019 this figure will rise to 40%." Comprehensive protection of the people Speaking to AVN, Menendez recalled that in Venezuela enabling laws have been enacted to, among other things, guarantee workers' rights, access to land, consolidation of communal economy, increased food stamps, social protection of the elderly, women and children, and the elimination of trawling. He further reaffirmed the feminist character of the Bolivarian Revolution, as evidenced by the enactment of legal regulations and the Law on Protection of Family, Motherhood and Fatherhood as well as the Law on Breastfeeding, which includes maternity leave, the third longest in the world to ensure the feeding and care of infants. In addition to this, the Bolivarian government enacted the Organic Law on the Right of Women to a Life Free of Violence and opened agencies to protect the rights of women. Vice President for Planning and Knowledge stressed that women along with indigenous peoples, youth, workers and fishermen have joined the Presidential Councils of People's Power, in an unprecedented process that plays an active part in the exercise of power by the organized communities to design and implement public policies next to the national government.
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Venezuela's oil minister: OPEC will continue to promote market stabilization Through a statement on its website, the group said it will maintain its production quota and that oil prices have been recovering gradually after sharp decline witnessed in late 2014 and early 2015, caused by oversupply and speculation.
Caracas, 05 Jun. AVN.Venezuela's Minister of Oil and Mining, Asdrubal Chavez, said members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) will continue working to promote the stabilization of the market and a fair price of oil barrel for both producers and consumers. Chavez expressed support for the decision made by the group during its 167th ministerial meeting, on Friday in Vienna, Austria, in which it was agreed to maintain their current ceiling of oil production of 30 million barrels (MBD) per day –set in December 2011– unchanged. "It was a very successful meeting. We made the best decision we could have made, and we continue to work to strengthen OPEC and have a reasonable and fair price for our main resource, which is oil," he said in statements broadcast by Telesur network from the Austrian capital. He suggested that the 12 member-meeting will influence the market behavior over the next six months. "We continue to monitor the market, working together, very close. There is a complete friendliness of all our countries," said the Venezuelan minister.
Prior meetings to the ministerial session, Chavez raised the need to promote unity and consensus among producers as a strategy to cope with the volatility of international oil prices. "The best way to stabilize the oil market is with the active cooperation of producers," he said while participating in the sixth edition of the OPEC's International Seminar. Top official of oil and mining called upon OPEC members and producers that are not part of the group to work on the definition of a joint energy policy to help stabilize the market. He also said that as a result of the indiscriminate rise of shale oil production from the United States, there has been a " involuntary price war between fraternal oil producing countries." He noted that faced with competition of these unconventional oils, traditional producers have reacted "moved by the excessive need to ensure their participation in the oil market." OPEC, founded in 1960, groups 12 member countries (Angola, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Ecuador, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Nigeria, Qatar, Iran, Libya and Venezuela), which export about 30% of oil consumed in the world, and possess 80% of global oil reserves, located and explored.
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FAO acknowledges Venezuela for a second time The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), acknowledged for the second time to Venezuela for its progress in the fight to eradicate hunger. The award will be delivered this month to President Nicolas Maduro. Venezuela has become an example of public policies to combat hunger, achieving to keep below a 5% the levels of undernourishment in the population. As part of the commitment assumed by the National Government to ensure that Venezuelans may count with food security, on March 16 was started a national plan of distribution of milk powder and meat products, amid a scenario of economic war and decrease in revenues. “These are investments for the development of the country. With or without the gringo threat, with oil at 40, at 20 (dollars per barrel), at whichever price it may get; with economic war, without economic war, we have the resources for infrastructure and housing. “ On that occasion, the Head of State approved 1,177 million bolivars for the expansion of the network of Abastos Bicentenario, 16 million dollars for the renovation of four corn flour plants and three billion bolivars for the improvement of roads in agricultural areas. For the FAO representative in Venezuela, Marcelo Resende, “Hunger in Venezuela is no longer a problem” and this a major achievement of the Bolivarian Government, that has achieved that a 75 percent of the population has access to the food public distribution network. www.rnv.gob.ve
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