South American country Venezuela is facing a "food emergency," leading President Nicolás Maduro to call on his countrymen to create urban gardens in their own homes to combat the current nationwide shortage, the National Public Radio reports.
Maduro went as far as establishing a Ministry of Urban Farming to help most of the 83 percent of Venezuelans who live in cities start their own little piece of green.
To inspire people to produce their own food and to be a model citizen, Maduro said in a speech that he and his first lady are raising 60 hens for their own household to consume.
Yahoo News Australia also reports that just last month a conspiracy between superiors of a state-owned supermarket chain called Bicentenario was discovered. A total of 49 people (including Bicentenario's director and supermarket managers) were arrested in multiple locations in the country for hoarding food and re-selling at a higher price during the shortage.
Opposition leaders insist that the government should instead use its resources to empower traditional farmers by loosening government grip on the prices of agricultural products and the misuse of much of the country's fertile lands. The fact that worldwide prices of Venezuela's main export product - oil - is falling doesn't help make things better as fewer dollars meant fewer chances to import food and other products from other countries.
Maduro, for his part, blamed the opposition for the shortage due to the "economic war" that he says is being waged against his administration.
According to Huffington Post, the government has implemented a new ID card system to have a more organized way of rationing food. This, as President Maduro describes it, is to record purchases and to stop hoarding. The system will be able to spot "suspicious purchasing patterns" and will bar people from buying the same products daily.
