For many families, every meal is a struggle in Venezuela's economic crisis

CORO, Venezuela -- Alnilys Chirino’s tiny fridge and pantry are almost empty — a handful of peppers and wilting herbs, a kilo of rice, half that of beans, a bit of canned meat, some flour. Chirino used to worry about food spoiling quickly under western Venezuela's punishing heat. These days, her meager supplies rarely last long enough to go bad.

Still, the 51-year-old must make those items stretch for days. Her three teenagers are counting on it. They sleep, study, work, pray, and play hungry. So do millions of Venezuelans across the country.

The latest unraveling of Venezuela’s economy, changes to foreign aid, sanctions from the United States, and cuts to state subsidies and programs have made many necessities simply unaffordable to the 80% of residents estimated to live in poverty. Housing, medicine, utilities – but no need is as dire as food.

In the western state of Falcon, where state-owned oil refineries offered plenty of well-paying jobs before the country came undone in 2013, more than two dozen residents, including Chirino, described to The Associated Press how their woes center on food and how they dwell on the issue — how to buy it, how much and where – every day.

Experts say that while a famine-level crisis is not imminent in Venezuela, the severe food insecurity is a disaster that will mark the population with lifelong physical and mental health challenges.

President Nicolás Maduro — sworn in this year despite credible evidence he lost reelection — has created economic conditions that largely limited people's access to food nationwide, with the value of wages plummeting. Soup kitchens that fed thousands, mostly children, have been forced to close as he targets real and perceived opponents through a new law restricting the work of nongovernmental organizations.

The government's press office didn't respond to a message seeking comment on food insecurity amid the economic crisis.

Parents, educators, doctors, humanitarian workers and religious leaders say food is simply out of reach to many, with children suffering the most. They go to bed early to avoid hunger pangs, skip school and snatch food from each other at aid sites.

Chirino's family is among those who increasingly fear the return of the malnutrition and starvation that gripped the country from 2016 to 2018. She worries constantly for her teenagers: Juan, José and Angerlis Colina.

“They ask me, ‘What are we going to do tomorrow?'" Chirino said. "'What are we going to eat?’”

For the Chirinos and millions of Venezuelans, each mealtime of each day is a struggle.

Juan Colina takes three rolls of bread — the only food he'll have for breakfast on this summer day — and dunks them in a sugary, orange-flavored drink. It was something of a treat. Money has lost so much value in the last few months that the family typically drinks only tap water and rarely eats protein.

They've grown used to it. Juan felt fortunate to wake without a headache. José wasn't so lucky and stayed in bed.

They often skip school when feeling this way. The law guarantees all students a daily free lunch, but that hasn't happened for ages, families and teachers across Venezuela told AP.

As the meals stopped and the quality of education fell, students began regularly missing school over the last decade, a trend documented by local and international nongovernmental organizations.

Health care experts say animal protein is the first thing families reduce or eliminate from their diet when prices increase, and they tend to substitute cheaper, less nutritious foods. But poor nutrition can lead to stunting, headaches, fatigue and other health issues in children.

Chirino knows that all too well.

“It’s their diet,” she said of her kids' headaches.

But the last time she could afford to purchase meat — enough ground beef for perhaps two servings — was May.

At lunchtime, José stayed in his room, his head pounding. Angerlis joined her mother and Juan at the table for lunch before heading to school.

Chirino cooked a pot of rice and another of black beans, both of which her mother had gifted her the day before, when the pantry was essentially bare. Chirino, Angerlis and Juan ate a bowl each. Juan chuckled when Angerlis took bites so fast she burned her tongue.

Days earlier, Angerlis said, a classmate who hadn't eaten fainted at school. But even knowing there would be no food on campus, she grabbed her bag and headed off.

Teachers and administrators across the country are renewing pleas for parents to keep children home if they've not had at least one meal and if they have no food to bring to eat during breaks. But not all abide by the request, and students cannot always hide their hunger from classmates and others.

Maduro’s government typically supplies schools with frozen whole chickens and some combination of arepa flour, rice, pasta, beans, sardines, canned lunch meat, milk powder, lentils, salt and cooking oil. But teachers, cooks and administrators say what they receive is inconsistent and insufficient.

And with little to eat at home, on the occasions when the scent of food wafts through school buildings, more students are asking for seconds.

“There are some who, my goodness, they repeat two or three times. There are kids who eat a lot,” Deyanira Santos, a cook at a 170-student school that hadn't received supplies in three weeks. “They have needs at home. ... ‘I have already eaten. Can you give me one to go?’ We put it in a container.”

At home, Chirino sorted through the clothing, accessories and linens she sells to neighbors and acquaintances. Her only income sources are the $70 a month she earns from her sales and a monthly government stipend of about $4. She spends it all on food.

The weakening of the bolivar is the driver of Venezuela's currency crisis. When a currency quickly loses significant value, people’s money buys less because prices — particularly of imported goods, like roughly half of Venezuela’s food – constantly rise to match the exchange rate. It also has meant high inflation and stagnant wages.

Venezuela’s monthly minimum wage of 130 bolivars, or $0.90, has not increased since 2022, putting it well below the United Nations’ measure of extreme poverty of $2.15 a day. Even with government stipends, many public sector workers survive on roughly $160 per month, while the average private sector employee earns about $237, according to the independent Venezuelan Observatory of Finances.

The price of a basic basket of food has topped $500, according to the Observatory, an organization of economists — some of whom were detained this summer after high inflation data was published, as the government cracks down on dissent.

“It’s becoming more difficult every day for people to access food of a certain quality,” said the Rev. Gilberto García, whose Catholic church runs a soup kitchen. “People eat, but they usually eat carbohydrates. And that’s how people survive.”

Chirino warmed canned meat and served it with rice for dinner. Her adult daughter and toddler grandson joined them — more mouths to feed, but they were grateful to have even a small meal on the table.

About a block away, people lined up outside the neighborhood convenience store.

Chirino is among the many Venezuelans who say they're buying food almost exclusively at corner stores, where they can run up an account and walk over one, two, even three times a day. City residents also buy from public markets, but grocery store trips are rare.

“We give credit to the neighbors who do pay back when they receive their paycheck or stipend,” Diego Reverol, whose family owns a corner store, said, referring to a stipend state employees receive on the 15th of the month.

Other government stipends are available to those who sign up for the ruling party-run subsidy program, but they're significantly smaller than those of state employees. The program also offers families the option to purchase a combination of food – the same as what's distributed to schools – monthly. However, most of the two dozen people in Falcon who spoke to AP said they'd not received the food since the spring.

Yamelis Ruiz said her family's challenges are compounded by the loss of critical help from the World Food Program, which distributed food, refurbished school cafeterias and served meals after reaching an agreement with Maduro’s government in 2021 to support the most vulnerable. WFP prioritized Falcon, with its massive sand dunes and mountain ranges that reach the Caribbean Sea, due to the population's particular problems with food insecurity.

But citing funding challenges, the WFP this year has deeply cut its aid in Venezuela — Falcon included — and beyond. Ruiz said she had already stopped receiving monthly shelf-stable food rations from WFP when the organization further reduced the number of days it would feed kids and families at schools, to eight from 20.

“Food or medicines. Either I buy one thing or the other,” said Ruiz, whose daughter has a congenital brain condition that requires costly treatment.

Even as local and international nonprofits have been forced to shut down assistance efforts in Venezuela, Chirino's church still offers a weekly lunch at its soup kitchen.

Chirino, a devout Catholic, feels blessed. She often attends Mass with her family before the meal, but on this day Juan felt too fatigued to make the service.

The extent of hunger across the country is somewhat unknown. Dr. Huniades Urbina, a pediatrician and former director of Venezuela’s largest public children’s hospital, said that's in part because government-run hospitals have banned personnel from including malnutrition in patients’ medical histories.

Chirino sees that hunger every week in the faces of those lining up for food. Juan managed to get out of bed and to church just in time for this meal: an arepa stuffed with ground beef and plantains.

More than 70 children sat, their chatty voices dwindling as they ate. Finishing in record time, dozens swarmed the counter where the volunteer cooks were ready to hand out leftovers. Some pushed; others raised their arms or stood on their tiptoes.

“Me, me, me,” some yelled, angling for a second arepa.

One boy hadn't bitten his yet when he noticed an empty-handed friend. Without hesitation, he split it in half. The boys shared, each done eating in less than a minute, and left.

Chirino had refused to take an arepa. She didn't want to keep one from a hungry kid. But when most of the children were gone, a cook handed her one. She began eating alone, and soon José joined her. He reached for her plate, grabbing half the arepa and taking a few bites.

Her son, too, was still hungry.