High Sulfur! It also mud, contains twigs, leaves, organic matter.
Expensive to lift, expensive to process... ...end of oil. On 2/7/07, Peter Hollings <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Wouldn't the immediate burden on Venezuela just be transient switching costs -- until new customers could be found for V's oil, and new sources for V to import goods from? As I understand it, V's oil is high-sulphur which requires specialized refineries. So, switching that could be a problem that would endure for a while, but, of course, that would only apply to the portion of V's oil refined in the US. I recall that there were discussions of V selling oil to China, but I think a pipeline to the Pacific was contemplated for that. Another factor, it seems, if the US tried to screw around with V, it might create an opportunity for China to come in as a white knight, investing US$ in refineries, etc. -- whatever was needed. All of this is not to negate the fact that the lack of diversification in V's economy reduces flexibility and makes it dependent. Peter Hollings -----Original Message----- From: PEN-L list [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Yoshie Furuhashi Sent: Wednesday, February 07, 2007 3:42 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] The Great Dollar Crash of 2007 On 2/7/07, Jim Devine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 2/7/07, Yoshie Furuhashi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > More than half of Venezuela's export goes to the USA and nearly 30% of > > its import comes from the USA. That's heavy-duty dependency, it seems > > to me. How long would it take for Venezuela to replace the USA as > > buyer and seller if it lost it? > > most V's exports to the US are oil, right? in which case, my argument > about a US export embargo still applies. An import embargo on V would > obviously hurt, but there are a lot of other countries that would sell > to V (perhaps at higher prices). Of course, oil revenues could be used > to pay for any higher prices. How dependent is Venezuela's oil production on import (capital, hardware, software, expertise, etc.) to keep it going? > me: > > > BTW, traditional dependency theory -- about how the structure of the > > > capitalist world economy distorts and stunts the economic development > > > of countries that had been under colonialist and/or neocolonialist > > > thumbs but are now formally independent -- is more sophisticated than > > > simply saying that just because country A trades a lot with country B, > > > country A is highly dependent on B. > > > > Sure, but, again, the conclusion would be the same. After all is said > > and done, Venezuela is among the most economically dependent on the > > USA. > > you're using the word "dependency" differently than dependency theory does. In the immediate sense, yes, though why Venezuela has become so dependent on oil revenues is the sort of topic dependency theory might cover. -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>
