“Agricultural production and food availability in Venezuela reached a low point in 2019, with levels similar to the 1950s. (…) Although there has been an improvement in the last two years, that does not mean that the production is reaching people’s tables,” explained sociologist Juan Luis Hernández, director at the Venezuelan Agrofood Network (RAV) during a recent forum on the situation of food security in Venezuela.

Susana Raffali, nutrition expert and advisor to the NGO Cáritas Venezuela, added that the food availability index in Venezuela stands at 80%, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). “This means that 20% of the Venezuelan population would have nothing to eat if all national food reserves were exhausted. (…) The ideal index is 100 or 120%”, she said.

Both experts warned that, although the Sustainable Development Goal of “Zero Hunger” shows “progress”, the indicators of malnutrition and inequality in the availability of food continue to be high in the country, which further keeps the State in a Complex Humanitarian Emergency.

Social inequality comes to the table

Ms. Raffali cited the 2023 National Survey on Living Conditions (Encovi) to warn that socioeconomic inequality still exists. “Even though more food is available, people do not have the means to pay for it.”

According to estimates by Cáritas, which surveyed more than 113 families in March 2024, between 30 and 50 percent of the population surveyed, especially those in a situation of poverty, consume less than half as many fruits, vegetables and proteins as the population with a higher income.

“The consumption of carbohydrates (flour) and sugars is the same at all levels (…) But, just because a person is not hungry does not mean that they are well fed,” she said.

The nutritionist reiterated that the figures provided by Cáritas are not a statistical reference for the entire country but rather a sample of the 17 states where the humanitarian organization carries out its work. The lack of official data between 2016 and 2019 is a “great challenge” for analyzing food security.

Caritas: the prevalence of survival strategies decreased by 8.4%

According to the NGO, the populations surveyed affirmed having been able to reduce their food “survival strategies” between 2023 and 2024. These strategies include selling their belongings, begging or working in mining or high-risk sexual services. The prevalence dropped from 25% to 16.6%.

“For Cáritas, we would no longer be in an emergency, but in a crisis. (…) For example, we are at a level of acute food insecurity similar to that of sub-Saharan Africa,” according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC AFI), Raffali said.

The nutritionist warned that 66% of the people surveyed still affirm having skipped a meal so that other members of their family could have some food. “46 percent of the respondents expressed eating food they would rather not eat, things they would never have thought about,” she said.

Only 80% of the households surveyed have a “minimum acceptable” consumption of two to three meals a day and an intake close to 2,100 calories. The most vulnerable populations are those where a woman (usually the mother) is the sole economic support of the family.

Cania: rates of overnutrition on the rise

Mariana Mariño, nutritionist, pediatrician and health manager of the Antímano Children’s Nutritional Care Center organization (Cania – Empresas Polar), revealed that the rates of overweight patients who have been treated by the institution have increased by at least 10% in the last year.

“But that doesn’t mean they are eating more or better. More studies are needed, but everything indicates that this is an expression of malnutrition due to an unbalanced diet,” she said.

Ms. Mariño also stressed that the statistical results of Cania – Empresas Polar are not representative of the entire country, but they are relevant for the disadvantaged neighborhood of western Caracas; However, the organization receives patients from all over Venezuela.

According to the 2023 Survey on Living Conditions (Encovi), nine out of ten families in a situation of “severe or extreme poverty” in Venezuela still consume the food provided by the Venezuelan State through the so-called CLAP boxes, which, according to Mariño, only provides flour, sugars and other carbohydrates.

“It’s one thing to feed people and another to nourish them,” she said.

OCHA: 22% of Venezuelan children and teenagers have moderate or severe stunting

Despite the opacity of the Venezuelan State, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) revealed that 350,000 boys and girls under five years of age were suffering from stunted growth due to malnutrition in Venezuela in 2022.

“They will not be able to recover to their normal size (…) This form of malnutrition is a chain that goes from the pregnant mother to the child and from generation to generation,” Raffali regrets, adding that the children and teenagers evaluated by Cáritas have lost from 1 to 3 inches from their normal height.

The advisor for nutrition in contexts of humanitarian emergencies highlighted that the figure estimated by OCHA represents 22% of the Venezuelan child population, taking into account the migration of almost eight million Venezuelans, according to the Inter-Agency Coordination Platform for Refugees and Migrants from Venezuela (R4V).

RAV: The population in severe food insecurity reached 33% in 2021

Mr. Hernández asserted that the production growth reported by the Venezuelan Association of Farmers (Fedeagro, one of the institutions that makes up the RAV) does not represent a “substantial improvement” for the country’s food security.

He proposed different hypotheses to explain this phenomenon, ranging from the smuggling of food and agricultural products to the export of some items or the low income of the population compared to the prices of food.

“The difficulties derived from the lack of income to buy food increased significantly in 2023 (and so far in 2024), reaching 61% of agricultural towns,” said the director of the Venezuelan Agrofood Network (RAV).

The expert in agricultural production in Venezuela stated that the shortage of fuel in communities far from the country’s main cities is another factor in the distribution chain that affects national food security. In 2023, the RAV estimated the scarcity of fuel at 25 to 41 percent, depending on the month under consideration.

“Unfortunately, we still have a long way to go to reach the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal for food security. All countries are lagging,” Hernández said.

The three specialists stated that the Venezuelan state must adhere to the National Constitution and existing regulations to mitigate food inequality as soon as possible. They recalled that “a solid legal body to protect the genetic diversity of agricultural products” was one of the positive aspects of the country highlighted by the UN Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Michael Fahkri, during his visit to Venezuela.

Translated by José Rafael Medina