“We have gone back about two centuries,” groans farmer Alfonso Morales who, for a lack of diesel in oil-rich Venezuela, must now rely on oxen to plow his land.
“Plowing a hectare with oxen takes three or four days. With a tractor it is only about five hours,” Morales, 28, told AFP by telephone from Merida in the Andes mountains, where he is finding it increasingly difficult to eke out a living.
Venezuela’s deep economic slump, worsened by US sanctions, has seen the former oil giant run low on fuel for domestic use — a deficiency felt even more acutely in the South American country’s rural, food-growing parts than in the capital, Caracas.
