A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
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Thiranjala Weerasinghe sj.- One Island Two Nations
?????????????????????????????????????????????????Friday, August 11, 2017
Cooking gas shortages force Venezuelans to turn to firewood
Maria Garcia sets the stove on fire at her house in San Cristobal, Venezuela August 5, 2017. Picture taken August 5, 2017.-People
queue as they try to buy gas cylinders at a distribution point San
Cristobal, Venezuela August 3, 2017. Picture taken August 3, 2017.
People queue as they try to buy gas cylinders in Puerto Ordaz, Venezuela August 8, 2017. Picture taken August 8, 2017.
PUERTO ORDAZ/CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuelan homemaker Carmen
Rondon lives in the country with the world's largest oil reserves, but
has spent weeks cooking with firewood due to a chronic shortage of home
cooking gas - leaving her hoarse from breathing smoke.
Finding domestic gas cylinders has become increasingly difficult, a
problem that oil industry analysts attribute to slumping oil output in
the OPEC nation - which is struggling under an unraveling socialist
economy.
State oil company PDVSA says the problem is due to difficulties in
distributing tanks amid four months of anti-government protests in which
its trucks have been attacked.
"I've spent three weeks cooking with wood and sometimes the food does
not even soften properly, I can't stand it anymore," said Rondon, as she
lined up to buy a cylinder under the scorching sun in the city of San
Felix in southern Venezuela.
More than 100 people were ahead of her in line.
Nine out of 10 Venezuelan homes rely on cylinders for home gas usage,
with only 10 percent receiving it via pipelines, according to official
figures. The government launched a plan 12 years ago to bring some 5
million households onto the natural gas network but was unable to follow
through.
Venezuela's socialist economy has been in free-fall since the oil price
collapse in 2014, creating shortages of everything from diapers to
cancer medication and spurring inflation to triple-digit levels.
President Nicolas Maduro says he is the victim of an "economic war" by
the opposition, and says violent street protests are part of an effort
to overthrow him.
With oil output near 25-year lows, PDVSA has been forced to import
liquid petroleum gas, or LPG, which is used to fill natural gas
cylinders. Venezuela imported 26,370 barrels per day of LPG in the first
half of 2017, according to data seen by Reuters.
PDVSA did not respond to a request for comment.
Long lines to buy cylinders have spurred protests. Demonstrators in May
burned 22 PDVSA trucks in a single day in response to the shortages.
The company says it is now distributing gas cylinders at night and
before daybreak due to such protests, which also include roadblocks that
prevent free movement of vehicles.
Additional reporting by Anggy Polanco in San Cristobal, Mircely Guanipa
in Punto Fijo, Francisco Aguilar in Barinas, Isaac Urrutia in Maracaibo
and Marianna Parraga in Houston; Editing by Chris Reese