[Peace-discuss] Fwd: :Cuba and Venezuela Create a Transnational
Construction Company
Alfred Kagan
akagan at uiuc.edu
Thu May 12 11:16:11 CDT 2005
Begin forwarded message:
> From: <unionyes at ameritech.net>
> Date: May 12, 2005 10:59:39 AM CDT
> To: <@returns.groups.yahoo.com;>
> Subject: [sftalk] Fw: [anti-cap-Discussion] CLNews: FYI:Cuba and
> Venezuela Create a Transnational Construction Company
> Reply-To: sftalk at yahoogroups.com
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Richard Mellor
> To: anti-cap-discussion at yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 9:12 AM
> Subject: [anti-cap-Discussion] CLNews: FYI:Cuba and Venezuela Create a
> Transnational Construction Company
>
> Content-Type: text/html; charset="UTF-8"
> Content-Language: en
> http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/news.php?newsno=1618
> Cuba and Venezuela Create a Transnational Construction Company
> Wednesday, May 11, 2005
>
> By: Sarah Wagner - Venezuelanalysis.com
>
> Caracas, Venezuela, May 10, 2005-Yesterday Cuba and Venezuela created
> a transnational construction company designed to reduce the housing
> deficit in both countries, as well as throughout Latin America.
> According to Edgar Camejo, the President of the National Fund for
> Urban Development (Fondur), the initiative forms part of the
> integration agreements made under the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin
> America (ALBA).
>
> Proposed by Venezuela two years ago, the ALBA is a trade block
> intended to counter the US-sponsored Free Trade Area of the Americans
> (FTAA). While the latter is guided by principles of neo-liberal
> economics and is set up to maximize profits, ALBA was created to
> reduce equalize economic disparities between countries. Through
> endogenous development and agricultural policies that place a
> country's self-sufficiency over its export sector, the ALBA aims to
> reduce employment and satisfy basic needs.
>
> While neoliberalism postulates that the market will correct
> disparities within and between countries, the ALBA pushes for concrete
> plans based on solidarity that make the best use of what a country has
> to offer in order to create a more egalitarian region that can compete
> with other regions on fairer terms.
>
> This emphasis on solidarity is evident in this transnational
> construction business. While Cuba will supply the machinery and
> equipment, Venezuela will is putting up the capital. According to
> Camejo, the first 100 million dollars of capital will come from the
> International Fund for the ALBA, which collects dues from each
> member-state.
>
> Additionally, Cuba and Venezuela signed a 25 million dollar agreement
> to build 1,400 housing in the Venezuelan state of Nueva Esparta. The
> construction of the first 300 residences is expected to be completed
> by August 1st.
>
> See Also: Venezuela and Cuba Deepen Relations and Support Alternative
> to FTAA
> www.venezuelanalysis.com/news.php?newsno=1606
>
> "The FTAA is just pieces"
> Venezuela and Cuba Deepen Relations and Support Alternative to FTAA
> Friday, Apr 29, 2005
>
> By: Sarah Wagner - Venezuelanalysis.com
>
>
> Caracas, Venezuela, April 29, 2005-During a two-day visit to the
> Caribbean island, Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez and Cuba's
> President Fidel Castro celebrated the inauguration of branch offices
> of the Venezuelan state-owned oil company PdVSA and the also state
> owned Banco Industrial de Venezuela in Havana. Also, they attended an
> international gathering of political activists designed to promote the
> Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA).
>
> Forty-nine agreements in areas such as commerce, energy, finances,
> agriculture, communications and technology were signed after which
> healthcare, education, housing, infrastructure and cultural
> initiatives were discussed.
>
> In addition to strengthening their economic ties and political
> alliances the proposals undertaken by the two nations, in particular
> the opening of a branch office of PdVSA, are an important step to
> further solidifying Petrocaribe. Petrocaribe is a Venezuelan-initiated
> joint oil operation designed to offset high oil prices to the
> Caribbean region by exploiting oil off Cuban shores, refining it in
> Cuba and selling it from Havana, thus reducing transportation costs.
>
> In order to consolidate this endeavor, PdVSA President Rafael Ramírez
> announced that PdVSA and Cuban oil company Cupet will build a
> lubricants plant, a shipping terminal and a storage facility as well
> as complete the Cienfuegos Soviet-initiated refinery. Petrobrás, the
> Brazilian oil company, is also expected to participate in the
> initiative.
>
> Ramírez, who is also the Minister of Energy and Petroleum, notes that
> these moves are part of Venezuela's strategy to diversify its markets.
> "We have advanced with Jamaica in terms of having refining capacity
> and with Trinidad and Tobago in commercialization; we are here in Cuba
> installing an operations base. We will sign an ensemble of documents,
> among them a lubricant project and [discuss] the possibility of
> advancing in joint projects. Additionally, there are diverse areas
> that are being studied," stated Ramírez on Wednesday night.
>
> According to retired Latin American Amoco executive Jorge Piñón
> Cervera, "[t]he expansion or retrofitting of the Cienfuegos refinery
> would be a very good investmentŠ One of the reasons the price of crude
> is so high is because of the lack of refinery capacity."
>
> Since 2000, Venezuela and Cuba have participated in what is often
> referred to as an oil for doctors program. Under this agreement Cuba
> provides Venezuela with 14,000 doctors and has trained Venezuelan
> teachers and educators in the world-renown Yo sí Puedo (I can do it!)
> methodology that is close to eradicating illiteracy in the oil-rich
> nation. In turn, Venezuela supplies Cuba with below market priced oil,
> as done with most Central American and Caribbean nations. According to
> Ramírez, this new arrangement will deepen, with the close to doubling
> of daily oil shipments to the Caribbean island will close to double,
> from 53,000 bpd to between 80,000 to 90,000 bpd.
>
> "Venezuela is long on capital and can use more talent. Cuba is short
> on capital and long on talent. This arrangement benefits both
> governments," notes economist Oscar A. Echevarria.
>
> Chávez's visit to the Caribbean island is likely to yield a slew of
> negative statements from US spokespersons, who are invariably
> irritated by the strengthening of the already tight Cuban-Venezuelan
> alliance. Relations have notably deteriorated between Caracas and
> Washington recently. Venezuela, referred to as Latin America's "model
> democracy" before Chávez was elected is now ranked by the CIA as the
> top "potentially unstable country" in the region.
>
> Washington fears that furthering deepening the political alliance
> between Cuba and Venezuela will disrupt the flow of oil from Venezuela
> to the US. Venezuela currently supplies the US with 15 percent of its
> oil and, as illustrated by US President George W. Bush's recent
> proposal to drill in the Alaska Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
> (ANWR), is causing the Bush Administration to take measures to ensure
> that "Americans [do] not live at the mercy of global trends and the
> decisions of other nations."
>
> "The FTAA is just pieces"
>
> The 49 agreements signed represent an important step in bilateral
> integration, both economically and politically, yet according to both
> Chávez and Castro, Petrocaribe and the plans to develop refining
> capacity in the Caribbean are more than just another average
> agreement. With the end goal of lowering shipping costs for the small
> Caribbean islands, the projects are an integral part of the promoting
> the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), the Venezuelan
> counter-proposal to the US-proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas
> (FTAA).
>
> Chávez's visit coincided with a Cuban-hosted international gathering
> designed to promote the Venezuelan proposed ALBA. Despite the fact
> that no other Latin American country (other than Cuba and Venezuela)
> has committed itself to the ALBA, Chávez and Castro feel that the FTAA
> is no longer competition.
>
> "What's left of the FTAA is just pieces, bilateral agreements," stated
> Castro during a three-hour speech at the conference. "The FTAA will
> not become reality with its mercantile criteria and its egotistical
> interests for managerial profits nor national benefits at the expense
> of other countries," Castro affirmed.
>
> Another important agreement, the joint initiative between the Banco
> Industrial de Venezuela (BIV) and the Cuban Ministry of Internal
> Commerce, is designed to promote national development. With the
> opening of the BIV office in Havana, bilateral commerce will be
> facilitated. Additionally, alternative possibilities of financing
> medium-sized businesses, cooperatives and producers, as well as
> capturing new markets and instigating new commercial alternatives in
> the Caribbean will be designed. Projects in the works include the
> manufacturing of solar panels and the creation of an experimental seed
> bank, nickel and cobalt mining projects and investments in
> communication.
> Trade relations between the two nations are also expected to
> deepened. At an expo of Venezuelan businesses, these sold 412 million
> dollars worth of goods such as clothing, shoes, tires, toys and spots
> equipment. Cuba will be opening a chain of stores in Caracas selling
> products in solidarity with the people. Additionally, a branch office
> of a Cuban bank will be established in the Venezuelan capital.
> --
>
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------
> "I'd rather vote for something I want and not get it than vote for
> something I don't want, and get it". Eugene Debs
>
> Visit my blog in the making: http://home.igc.org/~aactivist/
>
> Richard Mellor
> Retired member, AFSCME Local 444
> Oakland CA
> Check out our website: http://www.laborsmilitantvoice.com
>
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Al Kagan
African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration
University of Illinois Library
1408 W. Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL 61801
tel. 217-333-6519
fax 217-333-2214
akagan at uiuc.edu
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