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Attached is the link to the History of Venezuela

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Oil History in Venezuela

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Institute of the Black World 21st Century

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Venezuelan Oil Unifying Latin-America By Johannes Alvarez & James Fiorito, 2005 Stanford University — Hugo Chavez was named the fourth most influential person of 2005 in the world by Time magazine…

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Learn about this topic in these articles:

Assorted References

major treatment

anticlericalism
In anticlericalism: Latin America
In Venezuela, on the other hand, the government of Antonio Guzmán Blanco (1870-88) virtually crushed the institutional life of the church, even attempting to legalize the marriage of priests. Some of the restrictions were later relaxed, but on the whole anticlericalism remained dominant. A strong outburst...
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baseball

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Latin American architecture

mud slides of 1999
In Venezuela mud slides of 1999
...1999, devastating mud slides in Venezuela in December 1999. An estimated 190,000 people were evacuated, but thousands of others, likely between 10,000 and 30,000, were killed.
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conflict with

Dominica
In Bird Island
...of a tense dispute between Venezuela and Dominica. Dominica's claim is based on geographical criteria, since the island rises from a long submarine sandbank, the Aves Ridge, which apparently connects it with Dominica. Venezuela's claim stems from having maintained an armed force there and exercised acts of sovereignty by virtue...
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relations with

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major treatment anticlericalism In anticlericalism: Latin America In Venezuela, on the other hand, the government of Antonio Guzmán Blanco (1870-88) virtually crushed the institutional life of the church, even attempting to legalize the marriage of priests. Some of the restrictions were later relaxed, but on the whole anticlericalism remained dominant.

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The Collapse of the Venezuelan Oil Industry: The Role of Above-Ground Risks Limiting FDI | Baker Institute

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Venezuela, which has one of the largest hydrocarbon endowments in the world, offers a striking case study on the resource curse, write Francisco Monaldi, Igor Hernández and José La Rosa. This working paper is part of a series titled “The Role of Foreign Direct Investment in Resource-Rich Regions.”

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OIL DEPENDENCY AND ECONOMIC DIVERSIFICATION, A CASE STUDY OF BUHARI ADMINISTRATION, 2015-2023 | Journal of Political Discourse

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Venezuela's Overreliance on Oil Export

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Venezuela’s Crisis: A Cautionary Tale For Oil Nations | OilPrice.com

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Venezuela’s over-reliance on crude oil to drive economic growth and generate fiscal revenues, laid the foundation for the country’s collapse and the disastrous humanitarian crisis that is now unfolding

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Venezuela was once the richest, most stable, democracy in Latin America. What happened? - The World from PRX

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Venezuela used to be one of the wealthiest countries in the world. So what happened? The World’s Jason Margolis looks at the economic collapse that led to the election of Hugo Chávez in 1998.

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Boom-bust Cycles Due to Oil Prices

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Introduction

Venezuela, home to the world's largest oil reserves, is a case study in the perils of becoming a petrostate. Since it was discovered in the country in the 1920s, oil has taken Venezuela on an exhilarating but dangerous boom-and-bust ride that offers lessons for other resource-rich states. Decades of poor governance have driven what was once one of Latin America's most prosperous countries to economic and political ruin.

Venezuela has suffered economic collapse in recent years, with output shrinking by three-quarters and rampant hyperinflation contributing to a scarcity of basic goods. Meanwhile, government mismanagement and U.S. sanctions have led to a drastic decline in oil production and severe underinvestment in the sector. But Caracas hopes that Washington's 2022 decision to allow U.S. oil giant Chevron to resume operations in the country could signal a potential détente.

What is a petrostate?

Petrostate is an informal term used to describe a country with several interrelated attributes:

government income is deeply reliant on the export of oil and natural gas,

economic and political power are highly concentrated in an elite minority, and

political institutions are weak and unaccountable, and corruption is widespread.

Countries often described as petrostates include Algeria, Cameroon, Chad, Ecuador, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Libya, Mexico, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela.

What's behind the petrostate paradigm?

Petrostates are thought to be vulnerable to what economists call Dutch disease, a term coined during the 1970s after the Netherlands discovered natural gas in the North Sea.

In an afflicted country, a resource boom attracts large inflows of foreign capital, which leads to an appreciation of the local currency and a boost for imports that are now comparatively cheaper. This sucks labor and capital away from other sectors of the economy, such as agriculture and manufacturing, which economists say are more important for growth and competitiveness. As these labor-intensive export industries lag, unemployment could rise, and the country could develop an unhealthy dependence on the export of natural resources. In extreme cases, a petrostate forgoes local oil production and instead derives most of its oil wealth through high taxes on foreign drillers. Petrostate economies are then left highly vulnerable to unpredictable swings in global energy prices and capital flight.

The so-called resource curse also takes a toll on governance. Since petrostates depend more on export income and less on taxes, there are often weak ties between the government and its citizens. Timing of the resource boom can exacerbate the problem. "Most petrostates became dependent on petroleum while, or immediately after, they were establishing a democracy, state institutions, an independent civil service and private sector, and rule of law," says Terry Lynn Karl, a professor of political science at Stanford University and author of The Paradox of Plenty, a seminal book on the dynamics of petrostates. Leaders can use the country's resource wealth to repress or co-opt political opposition.

How does Venezuela fit the category?

Venezuela is the archetype of a failed petrostate, experts say. Oil continues to play the dominant role in the country's fortunes more than a century after it was discovered there. The oil price plunge from more than $100 per barrel in 2014 to under $30 per barrel in early 2016 sent Venezuela into an economic and political spiral, and despite rising prices in recent years, conditions remain bleak.

A number of grim indicators tell the story:

Oil dependence. Oil exports are expected to finance almost two-thirds of the government's budget in 2023, a slightly higher proportion compared to the previous year.

Falling production. Starved of adequate investment and maintenance, oil output has continued to generally decline, dropping by 2.5 percent in 2022 after increasing slightly the previous year. In 2020, it had reached its lowest level in decades.

Spiraling economy. Venezuela's gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by roughly three-quarters [PDF] between 2014 and 2021. However, the economy grew by an estimated 6 percent in 2022, and experts forecast additional growth of 6.5 percent in 2023.

Soaring debt. Venezuela has an estimated debt burden of $150 billion or higher.

Hyperinflation. Annual inflation skyrocketed to just over 130,000 percent in 2018, and though it has slowed in recent years, it remained at 234 percent in 2022.

Growing autocracy. Over the last decade, President Nicolas Maduro and his allies have violated basic tenets of democracy to maintain power. This includes restricting internet access and arbitrarily prosecuting and detaining political opponents and critics.

These issues-coupled with international sanctions and the COVID-19 pandemic-have fueled a devastating humanitarian crisis, with severe shortages of basic goods such as food, drinking water, gasoline, and medical supplies. According to a November 2022 survey, 50 percent of Venezuela's 28 million residents live in poverty, though that is down from 65 percent the year before.

Since 2014, more than seven million Venezuelan refugees have fled to neighboring countries and beyond, where some governments have granted them temporary residency. However, about 150,000 Venezuelan migrants have returned home since the pandemic began, often after losing their jobs in other Latin American countries.

How did Venezuela get here?

A number of economic and political milestones mark Venezuela's path as a petrostate.

Discovering oil. In 1922, Royal Dutch Shell geologists at La Rosa, a field in the Maracaibo Basin, struck oil, which blew out at what was then an extraordinary rate of one hundred thousand barrels per day. In a matter of years, more than one hundred foreign companies were producing oil, backed by dictator General Juan Vicente Gómez (1908-1935). Annual production exploded during the 1920s, from just over a million barrels to 137 million, making Venezuela second only to the United States in total output by 1929. By the time Gómez died in 1935, Dutch disease had settled in: the Venezuelan bolívar had ballooned, and oil shoved aside other sectors to account for over 90 percent of total exports.

Reclaiming oil rents. By the 1930s, just three foreign companies-Royal Dutch Shell, Gulf, and Standard Oil-controlled 98 percent of the Venezuelan oil market. Gómez's successors sought to reform the oil sector to funnel funds into government coffers. The Hydrocarbons Law of 1943 was the first step in that direction, requiring foreign companies to give half of their oil profits to the state. Within five years, the government's income had increased sixfold.

Punto Fijo pact. In 1958, after a succession of military dictatorships, Venezuela elected its first stable democratic government. That year, Venezuela's three major political parties signed the Punto Fijo pact, which guaranteed that state jobs and, notably, oil rents would be parceled out to the three parties in proportion to voting results. While the pact sought to guard against dictatorship and usher in democratic stability, it ensured that oil profits would be concentrated in the state.

OPEC. Venezuela joined Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia as a founding member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in 1960. Through the cartel, which would later include Qatar, Indonesia, Libya, the United Arab Emirates, Algeria, Nigeria, Ecuador, Gabon, Angola, Equatorial Guinea, and the Republic of Congo, the world's largest producers coordinated prices and gave states more control over their national industries. That same year, Venezuela established its first state oil company, the Venezuelan Petroleum Corporation, and increased oil companies' income tax to 65 percent of profits.

The 1970s boom. In 1973, a five-month OPEC embargo on countries backing Israel in the Yom Kippur War quadrupled oil prices and made Venezuela the country with the highest per-capita income in Latin America. Over two years, the windfall added $10 billion to state coffers, giving way to rampant graft and mismanagement. Analysts estimate that as much as $100 billion was embezzled between 1972 and 1997 alone.

PDVSA. In 1976, amid the oil boom, President Carlos Andrés Pérez nationalized the oil industry, creating state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA) to oversee all exploring, producing, refining, and exporting of oil. Pérez allowed PDVSA to partner with foreign oil companies as long as it held 60 percent equity in joint ventures and, critically, structured the company to run as a business with minimal government regulation.

The 1980s oil glut. As global oil prices plummeted in the 1980s, Venezuela's economy contracted and inflation soared; at the same time, it accrued massive foreign debt by purchasing foreign refineries, such as Citgo in the United States. In 1989, Pérez-reelected months earlier-launched a fiscal austerity package as part of a financial bailout by the International Monetary Fund. The measures provoked deadly riots. In 1992, Hugo Chávez, a military officer, launched a failed coup and rose to national fame.

Chávez's Bolivarian revolution. Chávez was elected president in 1998 on a socialist platform, pledging to use Venezuela's vast oil wealth to reduce poverty and inequality. While his costly "Bolivarian missions" expanded social services and cut poverty by 20 percent, he also took several steps that precipitated a long and steady decline in the country's oil production, which peaked in the late 1990s and early 2000s. His decision to fire thousands of experienced PDVSA workers who had taken part in an industry strike in 2002-2003 gutted the company of important technical expertise. Beginning in 2005, Chávez provided subsidized oil to several countries in the region, including Cuba, through an alliance known as Petrocaribe. Over the course of Chávez's presidency, which lasted until 2013, strategic petroleum reserves dwindled and government debt more than doubled [PDF].

Chávez also harnessed his popularity among the working class to expand the powers of the presidency and edged the country toward authoritarianism: he ended term limits, effectively took control of the Supreme Court, harassed the press and closed independent outlets, and nationalized hundreds of private businesses and foreign-owned assets, such as oil projects run by ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips. The reforms paved the way for Maduro to establish a dictatorship years after Chávez's death.

Descent into dictatorship. In mid-2014, global oil prices tumbled, and Venezuela's economy went into free fall. As unrest brewed, Maduro consolidated power through political repression, censorship, and electoral manipulation. In 2018, he secured reelection in a race widely condemned as unfair and undemocratic. Nearly sixty countries, including the United States, subsequently recognized opposition figure Juan Guaidó, head of the National Assembly, as Venezuela's interim leader.

For over a decade, Washington has imposed sweeping sanctions against Caracas, the most significant of which have blocked oil imports from PDVSA and prevented the government from accessing the U.S. financial system. Still, Venezuela has retained oil-trading partners, and analysts say that support from China, Cuba, Iran, Russia, and Turkey is keeping the Maduro regime afloat.

In January 2021, Maduro and his allies took leadership of what was the last opposition-controlled power center in the government, the National Assembly, after claiming victory in legislative elections. The opposition, including Guaidó, boycotted the vote, alleging that it was fraudulent, a charge reaffirmed by the Joe Biden administration and other foreign governments and international bodies, including Canada, the European Union, and the Organization of American States. However, regional elections that November further cemented Maduro's power and saw the fractured opposition win only three of twenty-three available governorships. Then in December 2022, after years of waning support, the opposition voted to remove Guaidó and dissolve his government, with plans to hold fresh presidential primaries in October 2023.

Meanwhile, there are some signs of a thaw. In November 2022, in part to help offset rising global energy prices due to the war in Ukraine, the United States permitted U.S. oil giant Chevron to resume limited operations in the country. In exchange, the Maduro government and the opposition agreed to continue dialogue following a yearlong stalemate. Still, given the dilapidated state of its industry, experts say it could be years before Venezuela's oil exports rise significantly.

Is there a path away from the oil curse?

A country that discovers a resource after it has formed robust democratic institutions is usually better able to avoid the resource curse, analysts say. For example, strong institutions in Norway have helped the country enjoy steady economic growth since the 1960s, when vast oil reserves were discovered in the North Sea, Karl writes in her book. In 2023, officials project that the petroleum sector will account for 33 percent of Norway's GDP. Strong democracies with an independent press and judiciary help curtail classic petrostate problems by holding government and energy companies to account.

If a country strikes oil or another resource before it develops its state infrastructure, the curse is much harder to avoid. However, there are remedial measures that low-income and developing countries can try, provided they are willing. For instance, a government's overarching objective should be to use the oil earnings in a responsible manner "to finance outlays on public goods that serve as the platform for private investment and long-term growth," says Columbia University's Jeffrey Sachs, an expert on economic development. This can be done financially, with broad-based investing in international assets, or physically, by building infrastructure and educating workers. Transparency is essential in all of this, Sachs says.

Many countries with vast resource wealth, such as Norway and Saudi Arabia, have established sovereign wealth funds (SWF) to manage their investments. Globally, SWFs manage more than $10 trillion worth of assets.

Analysts anticipate that a global shift from fossil fuel energy to renewables such as solar and wind will force petrostates to diversify their economies. Nearly two hundred countries, including Venezuela, have joined the Paris Agreement, a binding treaty that requires states to make specific commitments to mitigate climate change.

Economic diversification will be an especially difficult climb for Venezuela given the scale of its economic and political collapse over the last decade. The country would likely need to revitalize its oil sector before it could cultivate and develop other important industries. But this would take enormous investment, which analysts say would be hard to come by given Venezuela's unstable political environment, trends in oil demand, and rising concerns about climate change.

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opec (organization of the petroleum exporting countries)

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Venezuela: The Rise and Fall of a Petrostate

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Venezuela's descent into economic and political chaos in recent years is a cautionary tale of the dangerous influence that resource wealth can have on developing countries.

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What is Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution?

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From Hugo Chavez to Nicolas Maduro, the Bolivarian Revolution has influenced the political outlook of many Venezuelan politicians, inspiring them to take an anti-imperıalist stance.

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Uncovering the 5 Major Causes of the Food Crisis in Venezuela | Glocality

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Venezuela has been experiencing a food crisis for almost a decade. Rampant undernourishment of the population, coupled with empty shelves in the market, is gaining international attention as a humanitarian emergency. However, the causes of the crisis remain divided into two major arguments posited by the government and the opposition in a “blame game”. Both factions have made serious contributions to the outbreak of the food crisis. Through analysis of various data sources, this study was able to identify five major causes of the food crisis: (1) dependence on oil, (2) poor political infrastructure, (3) political power over welfare, (4) hoarding and reselling of goods in the black market, and (5) U.S. sanctions in the Venezuelan economy.

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Venezuela has been in the news on and off for the past couple of years. Scenes from the country have shown pictures of long lines at grocery stores, food riots, and young teenagers protesting in the streets with the national guard using tear gas against them.

Last year, for more than three months, thousands of Venezuelans protested daily against the government of Nicolas Maduro; many of them were young students. Over 120 people were killed during these protests at the hands of government forces. More than 5,000 people were arrested, and stories of abuse and torture were common, according to human rights organizations.

Venezuela, the country with the largest proven oil reserves in the world, is suffering a humanitarian crisis. Bordering Colombia and Brazil in South America, the mountainous country with white-sand beaches and the highest waterfall in the world has been engulfed in a political, economic, and social struggle for most of the 21st century.

In 1999, Hugo Chavez became president of the country. He pledged to fix income inequality in the nation by giving to the poor, who felt neglected in the country's classist society. Many Venezuelans fiercely believed in his promises, and his charismatic personality made many of his followers support him unconditionally.

Throughout the 2000s, Chavez increasingly tightened his grip on authority. He introduced a new constitution, began to strictly regulate the media, "threatened and punished his political opponents," according to a report from Human Rights Watch, and forged an alliance with the Cuban government. By 2013, before his death, Chavez was a force to be reckoned with - he had strategically placed his supporters at the most important levels of the government, the military, and the state-run oil company.

Before Chavez died of cancer in 2013, he named Nicolas Maduro as his successor. A former bus driver who later became foreign minister and vice president, Maduro was Chavez's right-hand man for most of his presidency. Maduro promised to continue his predecessor's legacy through established and popular social programs. Shortly after Maduro came to power, the price of oil dropped, and because 98% of Venezuela's export earnings come from oil, the state of the country declined rapidly.

The government began printing more money (which drives down its value), regularly increasing the minimum wage, and implementing price controls on certain products. Maduro has blamed the United States and other countries for starting an "economic war" against the country. (In late November, he raised the minimum wage 150% and compared President Donald Trump to Adolf Hilter for his imposition of economic sanctions against Venezuela.) Russia and China have provided financial help, with both countries backing Maduro's government through billions of dollars in "oil-for-loan" deals, as reported by Reuters. But because of the government's mismanagement of the economy and its high inflation rates, most Venezuelans struggle to have a sustainable life. In 2017 alone, 64% of Venezuelans lost weight, losing 25 pounds on average due to food shortages and an inability to pay for food. About a quarter of the population does not eat three times a day, and 82% lived in poverty as of 2017.

Venezuela's conditions have led to a mass exodus of refugees that mirrors that of war-torn Syria. Because Maduro has installed an oppressive and dictatorial government that gives him influence over all the branches, there are only small avenues to provide humanitarian aid to citizens in need.

Food shortages have caused a major wave of desperation. Venezuelans embark on a harrowing search for food, waiting in long lines at grocery stores for hours. The price of eggs and milk has been increasing every month, and many families struggle to afford these basic food staples. Toilet paper is practically nonexistent, and even pet food is hard to find. It has been reported that more and more Venezuelans are scavenging for food from the garbage on the streets.

Many resort to buying and selling food, medicine, and other necessities on a black market, but these goods are sold at a higher price. The minimum wage, as of June, was valued at $1.14 per month at the black market exchange rate, and that rate is constantly changing.

The conditions in hospitals and clinics are abysmal. People who are undergoing chemotherapy, require an emergency surgery, or even have a sinus infection are at risk of not receiving proper health care due to the crisis. According to Reuters, infant mortality increased by 30% in 2016, and cases of malaria surged by 76%. The government has even resorted to rationing electricity and water, giving varied reasoning but not taking any responsibility for the issue. This has caused outages throughout the country, some lasting between an hour or as long as 13 days. These power outages further complicate medical care for those who need it most, disrupting the already weak medical assistance they receive and making it worse. Imagine not being able to shower for multiple days in a row, relying on candlelight to see in your home, or not having access to the Internet - this has become a common occurrence for Venezuelans.

Nearly 3 million children are missing some or all of their classes due to the crisis. Some of these children are dying of starvation and suffering from severe cases of malnutrition, which inherently affects their ability to learn in school.

Many public schools have closed due to a lack of government funds. In the week leading up to the presidential election in May, the Venezuelan government closed schools to prepare them to serve as voting centers. It's expected that a generation of Venezuelan children will be impacted by high levels of illiteracy. The conditions have deteriorated across universities as well, with restrooms being out of order, computer rooms having no computers, and research budgets being slashed. Students are simply not finishing their education, many opting to leave the country for a better life instead of gaining their degrees. The student body at Universidad Central de Venezuela, commonly known as UCV, declined by 13% in 2017. Professors are also leaving in a mass exodus for better wages in other parts of the world, creating a shortage of educators.

The situation is so complicated that there are not many ways that the international community is able to help. Over 1.5 million Venezuelans have left the country in search of better living conditions. Over 600,000 Venezuelans have sought refuge in Colombia by crossing the border by foot, taking buses to Peru, or flying to Spain. As of this past May, Venezuelans were the top asylum-seekers in the U.S. The state of affairs keeps worsening, but Maduro has refused to accept any humanitarian aid being offered by Colombia, Brazil, or the United States. In the meantime, Venezuelans are subjected to horrifying living conditions, struggling without the most basic necessities that a person needs in order to survive.

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Related: Venezuela's Social and Economic Collapse Leaves Citizens Starving
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Venezuelans Are Starving as the Nation's Economic Crisis Continues

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Venezuela has been in the news on and off for the past couple of years. Scenes from the country have shown pictures of long lines at grocery stores, food riots, and young teenagers protesting in the streets with the national guard using tear gas against them.

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Venezuela’s economy runs on oil - and music

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Venezuela’s battered economy is one of the key battlegrounds in Sunday’s presidential election.

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Venezuela's oil sector currently sits at historic lows, both in terms of its production and its environmental impact. Decrepit pipelines and decaying refineries, unrestricted flaring of greenhouse gases, and government hostility toward environmental groups have all contributed to a growing crisis in one of the world's most biodiverse countries. While the Maduro regime often cites international sanctions as the cause of decline, Venezuela's oil sector woes are rooted in kleptocracy, incompetence, workforce mismanagement, and corruption dating back to the Chávez era. Even in a scenario of political transition, where sanctions relief would be on the table, it is unrealistic to assume that the ongoing environmental degradation caused by the country's crumbling oil sector would vanish automatically. Thus, questions of conservation and biodiversity protection should be elevated as key considerations in negotiations taking place between the opposition and the Maduro regime. The international community can do its part by elevating the voice of civil society actors within Venezuela and working to highlight the Maduro regime's disregard for the environment in the lead up to the United Nations Climate Change Conference.
Introduction

The grave consequences of Venezuela's environmental degradation can be felt in every corner of the country-and even the wider region. In the waterways near the Caribbean Sea, fishermen haul in oil-soaked catches from blackened boats. Recent satellite imagery provided by the National Aeronautical and Space Administration of Lake Maracaibo, one of the country's most ecologically diverse areas owing to its brackish waters, shows the body of water swirling with oil slicks. ¹ Oil workers fear for their safety as decrepit infrastructure contributes to mounting problems. Within the Amazon, Indigenous communities and environmental activists contend with well-armed criminal groups expanding the practice of illegal mining. ² While these challenges have been percolating for years, a combination of policy, corruption, incompetence, neglect, and criminal intent under President Nicolás Maduro has accelerated the onset of an acute environmental crisis in Venezuela.

Despite paying lip service to the ideals of "eco-socialism," the regime in Caracas has presided over a significant decline in environmental standards. In 2016, for instance, Venezuela's state-owned oil company Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA) announced it would stop reporting oil spills. That same year, Maduro announced the creation of the Orinoco Mining Arc, an expansive area in the south of the country that largely served as a legal patina for an uptick in illegal mining by criminal syndicates and guerrilla groups in this region. ³ The United Nations has denounced the exploitation and abuses that take place in the Orinoco Mining Arc. ⁴ Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and international bodies that have spoken out against this downward spiral have, in turn, been criticized and targeted by the Venezuelan government, which appears to have little interest in being held accountable for its ecological malfeasance. ⁵

While the list of environmental challenges Venezuela faces runs the gamut from deforestation to chemical pollution to poaching and more, one of the most consequential challenges by far is the decrepit state of the country's oil sector. The Venezuelan petrostate has the dual burden of depending on oil for nearly 99 percent of its export revenue while simultaneously being unable to make necessary repairs to oil infrastructure or retain a skilled workforce thanks to years of mismanagement, corruption, and kleptocracy. ⁶ Between 2010 and 2016, PDVSA self-reported more than 46,000 oil spills, a number that has likely increased since official reports stopped in 2016. Venezuela also ranks in the top seven countries in the world for gas flaring, the combustion of natural-gas byproducts that release major quantities of methane into the atmosphere. ⁷

Currently, these problematic trends show few signs of abating. Indeed, Tareck El Aissami, Venezuela's minister of petroleum and of industries and national production, has announced a plan to more than double oil production to 1.5 million barrels per day by the end of 2021. ⁸ While oil increases have been halting and inconsistent, any rapid increases in oil production under the Maduro regime-without concomitantly swift improvements in oil infrastructure-will only mean more spills, more flaring, and an even greater toll on the environment.

Despite paying lip service to the ideals of "eco-socialism," the regime in Caracas has presided over a significant decline in environmental standards.

Rising Venezuelan oil production is not solely the product of domestic policy, either. Venezuela is an increasingly viable partner in the eyes of companies such as the Chinese National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), which has shown a disposition to return to Venezuela after a potential softening of the U.S. sanctions architecture. The push to increase oil production is likely to continue, as the two most probable political outcomes for Venezuela both feature a potential relaxation of international sanctions. In any political transition that hands over power to the Venezuelan opposition, the United States and the international community would likely taper off sanctions dramatically. Meanwhile, the removal of sanctions serves as a powerful incentive for the Maduro regime to participate in its current negotiations in Mexico City with the Venezuelan opposition. Certainly, oil will remain a central facet of Venezuela's economy for the foreseeable future; a critical question remains whether the oil sector will continue on its downward trajectory toward greater ecological devastation or if Venezuela can chart a more environmentally sustainable course.

This brief proceeds in four parts. First, it sketches the decline in Venezuela's oil sector from the 1950s to today. Next, it details the severe and manifold environmental consequences of current Venezuelan oil production. It then outlines how oil would impact a possible political transition in Venezuela and what such a transition would mean for oil and the environment. Lastly, it concludes with a series of policy recommendations for how the United States can broach the tangled relationship between economic recovery, political transition, and environmental degradation.

The Decline of an Oil Powerhouse

Venezuela has been producing oil commercially for over a century, and today the country possesses roughly 300 billion barrels of proven oil reserves-the largest in the world. ⁹ However, Venezuela's oil production has undergone wild swings over the latter half of the twentieth century, shifting from record-high production in the early 1970s, with over 3.5 million barrels per day (bpd), to a precipitous decline through the 1980s and early 1990s, to once again eclipsing 3 million bpd in the late 1990s, to the current, paltry numbers of around 500,000 bpd.

In the decades following the discovery and commercial exploitation of oil in Venezuela, its production was largely the purview of foreign companies. In 1943, the government passed the Hydrocarbons Law, which required oil companies to turn over 50 percent of their profits to the Venezuelan state. During this period, Venezuela was the world's third largest oil producer, trailing only the Soviet Union and the United States. This gave the state an important source of income but, as in many petrostates, bound Venezuela tightly to the fluctuating global price of oil. ¹⁰ However, the consequences of Venezuela's overreliance on oil rents became increasingly clear during the 1950s, when overproduction led to a steady decline in oil prices.

In response to the drop in prices, Venezuela banded together with fellow oil-producing economies to found the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in 1960. OPEC sought to manage the supply of oil and prevent the kind of overproduction that tends to drive prices down. The organization proved successful; first it brought a modest rise in prices, then it exceeded all expectations in 1973. That year, a five-month embargo coordinated by OPEC against countries supporting Israel in the October War saw oil prices spike from around $3 to $12 per barrel. ¹¹ Venezuela rode this boom to record the highest GDP per capita in Latin America throughout the 1970s, while then-president Carlos Andrés Pérez triumphantly announced the arrival of "La Gran Venezuela," which would use oil wealth to further develop the nation. One of the first steps in this process was to decrease reliance on the operations of foreign oil companies, nationalizing the industry through the creation of PDVSA in 1976.

PDVSA by and large succeeded in producing oil, managing to reach a 2.3 million bpd output during its first four years of operation. ¹² Yet elected officials proved far less capable when it came to realizing the dream of "La Gran Venezuela." Several successive administrations turned a blind eye to corruption, while a multitude of state-owned enterprises provided ample opportunity for embezzlement, fueling Venezuela's budding kleptocracy. Some estimates valued the total amount lost to corruption and mismanagement during these decades at over $100 billion. ¹³ President Pérez himself was removed from his second term by the Supreme Court after he was found to have embezzled nearly $3 million. These scandals emerged even as PDVSA neared record-high levels of oil production of around 3.5 million bpd in 1997 and 1998. Venezuela's failure during the late twentieth century to curb endemic corruption and reinvest oil revenues in building a more diversified economy set the stage for the oil industry's downfall.

While the cracks in Venezuela's oil industry were already visible in the 1990s, the policies of Hugo Chávez, who swept into power on a disruptive leftist agenda in 1999, exacerbated those cracks into gaping holes. Chávez initially sought to curb the country's vulnerability to price fluctuations by reinvigorating OPEC to keep oil between $22 and $28 per barrel. ¹⁴ However, opposition to Chávez's authoritarian style of governance mounted. Following an attempted coup in 2002, thousands of workers went on strike, calling for new elections. PDVSA workers were heavily involved in this strike, dropping oil production to as low as 50,000 bpd. Chávez responded by firing around 18,000 PDVSA employees, nearly half of the company's total workforce at the time, replacing them with retirees and regime loyalists. ¹⁵ The consequences for PDVSA's operations were grave: the strike and its aftermath precipitated a large outflow of talent from the oil sector. After 2003, Venezuela would never again hit its oil production target of 3 million bpd.

Just four years later, Venezuela's oil industry took another hit when Chávez ordered the expropriation of ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips' assets in 2007. These companies had been brought in to develop Venezuela's Orinoco Belt, which contains vast but difficult-to-process, superheavy crude-oil reserves. The expropriation prompted a flight of foreign capital from Venezuela, leaving the country unable to access much of its heavy crude reserves efficiently. ¹⁶ Furthermore, without foreign direct investment, Venezuela found it nearly impossible to update its oil infrastructure, leading to dilapidated pipelines and hazardous equipment that exacerbated the environmental toll of the country's oil production.

Simultaneously, Venezuela under Chávez built a series of unsustainable economic ties with China, Russia, and Cuba. In the case of China and Russia, Venezuela racked up large amounts of debt. For instance, it has been the recipient of 45 percent of all Chinese policy-bank loans since 2005. ¹⁷ Russian investment has been comparably lower and primarily related to military financing, although the oil company Rosneft has spent over $1 billion on oil-field development in Venezuela as well. ¹⁸ Without cash to pay down these debts, the Chávez administration was forced to dip into oil exports, and roughly a third of PDVSA's oil production in 2012 was sent to China as repayment in kind. Oil exports were further diluted by Venezuela's partnership with Cuba, which in pre-Covid-19 years received as much as 90,000 bpd of heavily discounted oil in order to circumvent U.S. sanctions. ¹⁹ Squeezed by foreign creditors and facing a dramatic decline in domestic production, Venezuela found itself increasingly pushed into a corner with precious few exit strategies.

Nicolás Maduro, who ascended to the presidency in 2013 following Chávez's death, continued many of his predecessors' policies. Foreign debt grew steadily, and inflation began its precipitous climb from double to quadruple digits. When oil prices began to slide in 2014, ending with oil selling for under $30 a barrel in 2015-a far cry from the record-setting $140-$180 per barrel that Chávez enjoyed and subsequently squandered-the negative trends assailing Venezuela's economy came to a head. ²⁰ A workforce gutted of technical and managerial expertise waged a losing battle against collapsing infrastructure that was already hemorrhaging oil into the surrounding environment. Production declined precipitously from 2.5 million bpd in 2016 to 1.5 million bpd in 2018. By 2020, Venezuelan oil output had slid to 500,000 bpd, an overall loss in production of 3 million bpd from 1998 figures. ²¹

Following Venezuela's presidential crisis and U.S. recognition of Juan Guaidó as constitutional interim president in January 2019, Venezuela found itself under an intensified sanctions regime. In contrast to previous targeted sanctions, the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced a sanctions effort against PDVSA as an entity. ²² However, while the Maduro regime deflects blame and points to sanctions as the root of the oil sector's ills, the trends of corruption, kleptocracy, authoritarianism, and disregard for decrepit infrastructure all have legacies stretching back years, if not decades. The seeds of Venezuela's oil-sector destruction were sown by Chávez and watered by Maduro. Therefore, it does not follow that the removal of sanctions would swiftly resurrect an industry that had been struggling to stay upright years before their imposition. ²³

The seeds of Venezuela's oil-sector destruction were sown by Chávez and watered by Maduro.

The Environmental Impact of Venezuela's Oil Sector

The consequences of Venezuela's crumbling oil infrastructure are both varied and severe. These include coastal spills that have proven devastating to marine biodiversity, as well as inland pipeline ruptures and unrestricted flaring that produces vast amounts of harmful gasses. Further compounding this environmental degradation is the Venezuelan government's and PDVSA's reluctance to share information regarding oil spills. This leaves local communities and international watchdogs to do the heavy lifting in reporting on environmental issues. Yet their cries often fall on deaf ears, as the government in Caracas remains unwilling or unable to fix major environmental risks in a timely or effective manner. The Maduro regime often prevents scientists and experts from accessing areas where spills have occurred and declines to report on cleanup methods-or indeed whether there was a cleanup effort at all.

The clearest manifestations of the sector's impact on the surrounding environment are oil spills. Many of these occur along the country's coastal refineries, where heavy crude oil is processed before it can be shipped out. In 2012, the large Amuay refinery exploded, sending a toxic fireball into the air for days. By the time the Chávez government tamed the fire, it was the largest refinery explosion in in 15 years, killing nearly 50 people and injuring hundreds more. ²⁴ In July 2020, an oil spill originating in the El Palito refinery leaked over 20,000 barrels into the water, spreading into the protected Morrocoy National Park, an ecologically rich area home to mangroves, coral reefs, and several endangered species. ²⁵ The spill itself was not detected until August, when independent satellite reporting confirmed the existence of oil in the waters near Morrocoy. In late August, PDVSA announced it was taking steps to clean up the oil, but the company neither addressed the crumbling infrastructure that led to the spill nor invested in cleaning anything beyond beaches, allowing the oil that remained in the ocean to continue to circulate. In June 2021, an oil tank at Punta Cardón in Falcón State leaked through a crack in its base. Rather than repair it, the base was instead left to leak its contents-3.6 million liters of gasoline-over the course of nine days. The facility had not been checked since 2016, despite an order to perform biyearly maintenance. ²⁶

The El Palito incident reflects a common pattern in Venezuela, especially among coastal spills. Just weeks later, an underwater pipeline in Río Seco burst and began spilling into local fishing grounds. The incident was first captured in a video posted to social media. ²⁷ Again, PDVSA took no action until a protest organized by the fishing community elevated the issue and led to local beach cleanup efforts. Even after PDVSA intervened, the consequences for the local economy were disastrous. Oil either kills or contaminates nearby marine life, leading to a severe drop in the fishing upon which coastal economies largely depend. What fish they can catch tend to contain traces of hydrocarbons, sickening those who eat them and further detracting from the well-being of local communities. Spills have longer-lasting impacts as well, with NGOs and climate experts indicating many ways in which oil remains in the ecosystem long after visible signs of leakage vanish. Hydrocarbons can be deposited in the sediment on the ocean floor, where they can be released back into the water at a later date, while damage to coral reefs can have a domino effect on biodiversity that may take years to reverse. Indeed, the Morrocoy National Park is expected to require at least 50 years to make a full recovery, assuming no future spills delay this further. ²⁸ In all of these incidents, there is a disturbing pattern: the Venezuelan regime's desire to reopen refineries as soon as possible exacerbates the response, prevents lessons learned, and makes future catastrophes more likely to occur.

Inland, Venezuela also relies on an aging network of pipelines to move oil and liquified natural gas from wells to refineries-a challenge that is exacerbated by Venezuela's extra-heavy type of crude. In March 2021, an explosion along a key natural-gas pipeline ground oil production in 85 wells to a halt. ²⁹ PDVSA itself estimates that around $8 billion in investment would be necessary for updates to the pipeline infrastructure alone in order to return oil production to late 1990s levels. ³⁰ In all likelihood, this is an underestimate, yet it reflects the undeniable fact that the Venezuelan government simply cannot afford, and chooses not to invest in, updating aging pipelines. And although PDVSA is no longer reporting spills, the head of Venezuela's Unitary Federation of Petroleum and Gas Workers estimates that oil spills are an almost daily occurrence in some states, painting a troubling picture as pipelines continue to degrade. ³¹

At the oil wells themselves, a poisonous combination of poor infrastructure, lack of capital, and a drought of technical expertise has exacerbated the equally toxic problem of flaring. Flaring is a means to relieve pressure that builds up in the form of flammable natural gas during pumping. While a necessary safety measure in some cases to reduce the risk of explosions at oil wells, flaring is also a major source of greenhouse-gas emissions. As previously mentioned, Venezuela was the sixth largest flaring country in 2020, with the volume of flared gas rising despite dramatic losses in oil production. ³² This is driven by the fact that Venezuela's energy sector has lost much of its capacity to collect and utilize natural gas, choosing to simply burn it off instead. ³³ The carbon dioxide and methane released from unrestricted flaring have global implications, contributing to ocean warming and accelerating climate change.

Finally, while illegal mining has rightfully garnered much of the attention for its connections to organized crime, Venezuela's energy sector also fuels profitable smuggling networks, to the detriment of the country's most vulnerable residents. Prior to the collapse of the Venezuelan economy, government subsidies for gasoline created smuggling routes to neighboring Colombia and Guyana. On the eastern border, members of the Warao Indigenous community were heavily implicated in the illegal gas trade with Guyana. ³⁴ In northwest Venezuela, elements of the National Liberation Army, a Colombian guerrilla group, took over what was formerly an Indigenous-led cooperative meant to oversee the gasoline trade with Colombia. ³⁵ Now, as Venezuela faces an acute petroleum shortage, smuggling routes have not disappeared; instead, in a twist of irony, desperate Venezuelans now look to Colombian gasoline to support everyday life. ³⁶ Corrupt border police and entrenched criminal networks make Venezuela's borders porous, leading to rising violence that falls disproportionately upon the minority and underrepresented groups who find themselves at the bottom rungs of smuggling operations.

Despite a proud history of record levels of production, Venezuela's oil sector is in such a state of disrepair that desperate locals have resorted to converting PDVSA's crumbling equipment into scrap metal and selling it to survive. ³⁷ Ultimately, the oil sector in Venezuela represents a large share of the responsibility for the country's current environmental crisis. While a future accord between the Maduro regime and opposition may prompt significant changes in oil production, there are few obvious exits from the industry's current vicious cycle, in which economic crisis fuels ever-expanding environmental degradation.

The Role of Oil in Any Political Transition

Given the centrality of oil to Venezuela's economy, its future role under a potential power-sharing agreement deserves careful consideration. However, for the time being, ongoing negotiations between the Maduro regime and opposition have skirted this contentious issue, focusing mainly on upcoming regional elections and the rule of law. In a recent joint statement from the Mexico City talks, the parties announced their agreement on Covid-19 relief measures, as well as an agreement on Venezuela's disputed border with Guyana. ³⁸ In these negotiations, the parties are attempting to find a middle ground between a government bent on seeing U.S. and EU sanctions lifted and an opposition demanding the release of all political prisoners and immediate presidential and national assembly elections.

While oil has thus far remained off the table in negotiations, it is worthwhile to consider the role of the Venezuelan oil industry-and PDVSA in particular-under two possible transition scenarios. If the opposition participates in upcoming elections and manages to win several gubernatorial and mayoral campaigns, there could be a modest form of power-sharing agreement between the Maduro regime and opposition (though this is still unlikely to happen). Under this outcome, a member of Guaidó's Unitary Platform could be appointed to the Ministry of Industries and National Production or the Ministry of Popular Power of Petroleum. Although highly unlikely, an appointment to a central ministry would be a powerful signal of Maduro's willingness to meaningfully accommodate opposition demands. In the oil sector, this could also be grounds for removing major sanctions against PDVSA. There is good reason to doubt Maduro's willingness to sacrifice such a vital ministry; however, if it appears the quickest route to economic recovery, such a deal may become increasingly desirable.

The second transition scenario is the fall of Maduro's government, which the opposition has been working toward for several years. While this seems a remote possibility at the moment, if current negotiations lead to meaningful progress on the competitiveness, transparency, and integrity of elections, there may be hope in the future for the opposition to be electorally competitive. The Unitary Platform appears to enjoy some popularity in unofficial polls, but the opposition remains fractured between those wary of any participation in electoral politics and those seeking change from within. ³⁹ If current trends are sustained, the Venezuelan opposition may deem the climate right to lead a full-fledged campaign in the 2024 presidential elections. Should this effort gain sufficient traction, opposition leaders might find themselves in a far stronger position to present themselves once again as the legitimate government. An opposition-led government would likely prompt an even more positive response from U.S. policymakers-and a dramatic lifting of sanctions and other punitive measures.

However, under either circumstance, the Venezuelan opposition is unlikely to inherit an oil sector capable of reviving the country's moribund economy. Even assuming sanctions relief and increased demand for oil lead to an uptick in production, PDVSA's structural challenges will not be resolved by a change in leadership alone. Especially with respect to the intersection of oil production and environmental degradation, Venezuela needs to attract large sums of foreign capital and development assistance to plug its leaking infrastructure. ⁴⁰ Without these investments, increases in production risk exacerbating harmful practices such as unreported spills and gas flaring. In the same vein, sanctions relief would not revive the presence of foreign oil companies still wary of Chávez-esque expropriations. Accordingly, foreign capital is especially unlikely to return in large amounts, especially under a scenario where the opposition is not fully in charge.

Under either circumstance, the Venezuelan opposition is unlikely to inherit an oil sector capable of reviving the country's moribund economy.

Furthermore, Venezuela's prospects for an oil-driven economic recovery appear doubtful in the near term. Recent statements by OPEC show that the conglomerate expects oil demand to rise in 2022 after plunging due to the pandemic-induced constriction of global travel. Yet the emergence of new variants or outbreaks may cause this reopening to be slower than anticipated. ⁴¹ A more long-term view envisages Venezuela struggling to attract outside investment. While plentiful, the majority of Venezuela's oil reserves are in the form of heavy crude, a variety that demands more time and labor to render usable. This means that investments in new oil fields require a high initial level of capital for specialized drilling and refining. Investors are likely to make this gamble only if they believe that PDVSA has the competence to maintain output, that it will remain faithful to its contractual obligations, and that oil prices will be high enough to make the initial investment profitable once production fully comes online. Neither the current political instability in Venezuela nor the global uncertainty surrounding the future of oil makes for an auspicious environment for such investment.

However, the forecast is not entirely bleak for Venezuela in a political-transition scenario. Easing restrictions on trade, for instance, would allow the country to import the diluents needed to refine its heavy crude oil into a more marketable form, picking up some of the slack in Venezuela's current oil supply, which has been hobbled by a lack of diluents to blend its crude. ⁴² More access to diluents would improve the competitiveness of Venezuelan oil on the world market, where it will be able to trade more easily. Meanwhile, an opposition government more closely aligned with the United States may be able to negotiate more readily for debt relief to wean itself away from China, thereby freeing up more oil for export instead of repayment in kind.

Finally, a political transition could lead to progress on the environmental front, even without a total takeover of the oil industry by the opposition. Greater opposition influence within Venezuela's Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, the Ministry of Industries and National Production, or the Ministry of Popular Power of Petroleum could reinvigorate these departments and lend desperately needed support to the country's struggling environmental NGOs. Straightforward policies such as more fastidious reporting of oil spills or new protective legislation for national parks could have an outsized effect in the country, which has long tried to sweep such issues under the rug.

Policy Recommendations

There are several areas where Washington can continue pushing Venezuela in the right direction politically while making important strides to curb some of its worst environmental trends. While immediate gains might be achieved through diplomacy, the ecological crisis plaguing Venezuela has deep roots that demand a sustained effort to extirpate. In both the short and long term, the United States should:

Elevate the voice of civil society in current negotiations. Venezuelan civil society groups have been some of the staunchest opponents of environmental degradation under Maduro. Because current negotiations have focused primarily on elections and constitutional questions, including the voices of environmental groups is particularly essential to putting these issues on the agenda in a substantive manner. Already, after the August round of talks in Mexico City, the Maduro regime and Venezuelan opposition declared they would adopt a consultative mechanism for civil society actors to make their voices heard.⁴³ The United States should closely monitor the adoption of such a mechanism and, together with the other nations party to these talks, encourage the presence of key environmental groups within Venezuela, especially those representing Indigenous peoples and other vulnerable groups. Beyond the Mexico City talks, the United States should highlight the work and reporting done by these groups within Venezuela, especially those leveraging satellite technology to piece together oil spills and other environmental catastrophes, to counter the Maduro regime's policy of denial and cover-ups. Creating a formal channel for environmental groups to contribute to talks also ensures that future conversations surrounding the oil industry are not carried out in a vacuum.

Advocate for the creation of an independent regulator for PDVSA, especially in a political-transition scenario. A major determinant of whether Venezuela's oil industry will be able to rebuild and grow in a sustainable fashion is PDVSA's ability to reform itself and become a reliable partner for foreign investment. The state-owned oil company has so far struggled to recover after its Chávez-era decimation, while its proximity to the Maduro regime means there are precious few mechanisms available for proper accountability. The Venezuelan government can take a major step toward fixing this problem by setting up an independent regulatory body to set oil-industry policy and keep the monopolistic power of PDVSA in check. There are adequate models to be found in neighboring Colombia and Brazil, where government hydrocarbon companies are responsible for day-to-day operations, but autonomous agencies can set policies with respect to foreign partnerships. A regulator in Venezuela, if properly supported, could act as a powerful signal of the country's reliability and openness to future joint business ventures-especially in a scenario of political transition, wherein increasing Venezuela's oil output would likely be an explicit goal of U.S. policy.⁴⁴ It can also be a tool for enhancing environmental accountability by taking over responsibility for reporting oil spills, flaring figures, and other climate-related data.

Encourage greater private investment in Venezuela and incentivize PDVSA talent to return, especially in a political-transition scenario. The United States should recognize that, in a political transition, Venezuela's economic recovery will not be accomplished through the removal of sanctions alone. Instead, Washington would need to actively encourage private enterprises to lend their expertise and resources to building a stronger, healthier Venezuelan economy, especially in the hydrocarbons industry. Former PDVSA employees are scattered throughout the world, and incentives should be given for them to return to work in Venezuela-even if for a limited time only. Although confidence in PDVSA's ability to abide by contracts remains low, major oil companies' interest in Venezuela has not vanished. For instance, Chevron remains committed to its operations in Venezuela, while CITGO stands to gain significantly from reopening trade with PDVSA.⁴⁵ In CITGO's case, the United States could encourage the company to make targeted investments to update pipeline infrastructure in Venezuela. If the United States does not back private-sector investment in PDVSA, state-owned oil companies in China and Russia are all too eager to pick up the slack, without guaranteeing any concern over the industry's environmental impact.⁴⁶ Thus, under a scenario wherein the sanctions regime is relaxed, the critical question is not whether Venezuela's oil sector will receive outside investment, but who the dominant partners with the new PDVSA will be. Furthermore, the United States should not limit itself to investment in the oil sector but engage with companies involved in ecotourism or sustainable mining practices to help diversify Venezuela's economy. These steps are contingent on the political situation within Venezuela and may take years to begin to bear fruit. However, it is because of this gradual nature that work on supporting private-sector investment needs to begin sooner rather than later.
Ryan C. Berg is senior fellow with the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. This project was made possible with support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The CSIS Americas Program is grateful to USAID for its support.
CSIS Briefs are produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a private, tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy issues. Its research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take specific policy positions. Accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions expressed in this publication should be understood to be solely those of the author(s).
© 2021 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. All rights reserved. Please consult the PDF for references.

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The Role of the Oil Sector in Venezuela's Environmental Degradation and Economic Rebuilding

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Senior Fellow Ryan Berg discusses the decline of Venezuela's once-powerful oil sector, the environmental impacts of the oil sector in Venezuela, the role of oil in any political transition, and provides policy recommendations to address these issues.

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Escaping the Abyss: The Human Cost of Venezuela’s Oil Dependency | YIP Institute

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This capstone looked into the cost of humans for Venezuela’s Oil Dependency. The brief explores the history and background of the dependency.