With the food shortage seriously escalating over the last few months in Venezuela, criminals have thought out a new place to steal from: public schools.
(FOX)- In the past two months, the National Federation of Parents (Fenasopadres) received more than 25 reports of break-ins in schools around the country in which thieves took non-perishable food items from the pantries.
The thieves come after dark and the robbery is usually discovered the next morning, which means no food for hundreds of kids that day – or perhaps that week.
“Most schools don’t have any kind of surveillance despite the many requests we have made to the authorities,” Alexander Ramírez, a representative of Fenasopadres, told Fox News Latino.
With the food scarcity index currently at 82 percent, according to local polling firm Datanalisis, groceries and anything edible have become a precious commodity.
“They steal anything that is available, from wheat for the arepas to butter, milk and vegetables,” Ramírez told FNL.
Most of these products’ prices are government-regulated, which is why they become scarce — it creates a black market where groceries are sold at a higher price, translating into a lucrative business for those people call “bachaqueros.”
“We think they take some food for personal use, but most of it is sold at a higher price,” Ramírez said.