Venezuelans do not dare to travel by car because of lack of gasoline

Veronica Perez (Valencia, Venezuela) is familiar with the constant lack of necessities in Venezuela.

But now, she has had to give up this habit, because of lack of gasoline – something that should be abundant in the country with the world’s largest oil reserves.

Wandering around searching, queuing for hours and gas stations closed long ago have made residents of Venezuela’s border cities miserable.

A line of people lined up in front of the supermarket next to a row of cars waiting to buy gas in San Cristobal.

However, since the end of October, cities in the densely populated central regions of the country, such as Valencia or the capital Caracas, have also begun to lack gasoline, due to a decline in crude oil production in Venezuela and gasoline output at factories.

Last year, Venezuela produced more than 2 million barrels of oil per day.

Although supplies in Caracas and Valencia have recently been restored after a long disruption, Venezuelans are still forced to change their daily habits.

`I’m so afraid of running out of gas. It has changed my life so much,` said Elena Bustamante – a 34-year-old English teacher in Valencia.

Venezuela’s GDP has shrunk by more than half since President Nicolas Maduro took office in 2013. Falling oil prices and falling crude oil revenues have put the economy in trouble.

Despite falling domestic demand due to the recession, Venezuela’s oil industry still finds it difficult to produce enough gasoline.

Increasing gasoline prices, according to Mr. Maduro’s reform pledge in August, could cause demand to plummet.

Oil production in Venezuela has long been in decline, due to years of underinvestment.

The oil refining sector is invested to produce 1.3 million barrels of fuel per day.

The largest factory – Amuay currently only produces 70,000 barrels a day, although the capacity is 645,000 barrels, Reuters quoted a source close to PDVSA as saying.

In the first eight months of the year, Venezuela imported an average of 125,000 barrels per day from the US, up 76% over the same period last year.

Some unsatisfactory products also forced PDVSA to recall, further causing supply shortages in Caracas.

Gas shortages kept Andres Merida, a liberal activist in Valencia, from going to a meeting with clients last week.