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The producer is the one who harvests, breeds or manufactures the product and launches it to the market, earning a percentage to cover his expenses and generate profit, then these products reach the large distributors and from there they continue to pass from hand to hand until they reach the seller, and since everyone makes a profit, the price is inflated.
The shorter the commercialization chain, the cheaper the product is obtained by the buyer, which is why markets and supermarkets are cheaper, also taking into consideration the cost of transportation, which forces the margin between the final producer and the intermediaries to increase.
The fuel crisis in Venezuela is an inflationary factor since everything is transported by road and only in 2 or 3 states there are trains between towns that can take the product from the producer to the buyer.
When Chavez came to power he spoke of a railroad network to lower the cost of products and to make the transit of people to the cities faster and more effective, but it was forgotten and corruption ate it up, and abandoned railroad tracks and unfinished stations can be seen in some states of the country.
But the producer's problem now is not only transportation, credit shortages, or obstacles to their work, but an insatiable dragon has appeared that is ruining them, represented by officials from various state entities, including the security forces and the army.
In order to produce, it is necessary to pay vacuna, that is to say, to give part of what is earned to a third party who does not invest, but rather guarantees that the product reaches the intermediary and is not robbed at a checkpoint.
Blood has run to the river when the producer has tried to take his products to the consumer himself, because even though he meets all the legal requirements, he must pay bribes at every checkpoint and even any law enforcement agent has the luxury of extorting him.
And these payments are not necessarily in cash, but also in the product it transports.
For example, someone who makes cheese in the area where I live, one day decided to take it himself to the businesses that sold it in order to reduce costs, and the payment of bribes resulted in the cheese arriving more expensive than the way it was sold by those who were protected by that network of corruption.
This practice is so horrific that it has undermined homes and when my daughter was in preschool they asked the children who were 4 or 5 years old what they wanted to be when they grew up and most of them answered, police or national guard since they have the most money.
This is one of the main reasons why there are fewer and fewer producers or people venturing into planting, breeding, manufacturing or make any similar activity.