The Venezuelan Refugee Crisis

     We saw the young father and his toddler daughter on a very rainy evening. He was seated on a blanket on the corner outside of our urbanización with his sleeping daughter in his lap. They huddled beneath a broken umbrella.  We were walking home from dinner, leftovers in hand. “You hungry?” I asked.  He put a finger over his lips, said, “shhh,” and pointed to his daughter.  “Yes, I am,” he whispered.  “Here’s some food if you want it,” I whispered and handed it to him.  “Thanks,” he said. “Where are you from?” I asked, because of his accent.  “Venezuela.  We arrived two months ago.  No work yet.  Luckily we’re sleeping in a shelter but we spend our days out on the street.  I need to find work but with the girl…”. “Yes,” I said.  He said good night and thank you.  And we left him in the rain.  We felt unsettled leaving them out in the rain and mulled over ways that we could help.  We decided to give him a small amount of money, enough to feed himself and his daughter for a handful of days, however when Nick wandered back out to the street, they were gone. 

Public domain photo from Shutterstock

The grim reality is that many street corners in Cuenca are occupied by Venezuelan refugees. Most of them are young adults with kids in tow. They are frequently selling garbage bags, candy, toilet paper, and snacks to passing vehicles. These are the low paying jobs that don’t require work visas. These are the jobs that refugees can get while they wait, sometimes for years, for their asylum cases to be processed. Many of them are teachers, dentists, former business owners and other professionals who fled Venezuela and have not yet gotten their refugee status or professional credentials recognized. 

Venezuela, formerly one of the wealthiest and most prosperous countries in South America, has been in the midst of a severe socio-political and economic crisis for several years.  The root of this crisis is multifactorial but includes the long-standing authoritarian government, falling oil prices and production, and international sanctions as a result of human rights abuses. High unemployment and difficulty in accessing food and other basic necessities, including medicine, have forced millions of Venezuelans to flee the country in search of a better life.

From Venezuelanalysis.com

The Venezuelan currency, the bolivar, has become and unstable and devalued currency. Inflation has devalued the bolivar by several orders of magnitude, and wages have fallen far behind the inflation rate. The IMF estimates that the gross domestic product has shrunk by almost 80% since 2013. The “Venezuela Café Con Leche Index” was created to track inflation using the price of a cup of coffee as the measurement. According to the index, in December 2021, the price of a cup of coffee was 9 bolivars, up from 1.5 bolivars a year before, an increase of 445 percent.  Venezuela has re-denominated the bolivar two times in the past three years. Most recently, it lopped five zeroes off.  

Finding food in Venezuela has become a Herculean task. Supermarket shelves are frequently empty. These shortages have been caused by a simultaneous reduction in food production and in food imports. The Venezuelan Health Observatory (OVS) estimates that food production decreased by more than 60 percent between 2014 and 2018. The Chávez and Maduro administrations crippled the agricultural sector by expropriating farms and implementing price controls. This reduction coincided with a decrease in food imports by 70 percent between 2014 and 2016. The high prices and scarce supplies of food made 80 percent of households food insecure in 2017.

From el mundo.com

The economic and political crisis has also led to the collapse of the national healthcare system. Medicine imports decreased by 70 percent between 2012 and 2016. In October 2018, the Venezuelan Pharmaceutical Federation announced that 85 percent of essential medicines were unavailable. The main victims of these shortages are patients suffering from cancer, heart problems, and chronic illnesses, like HIV and diabetes. According to the UN in 2019, the lives of 300,000 people are at risk because they have not received needed medicines for more than a year.  However, the problems extend beyond medication scarcity.  Emergency rooms, operating rooms, and ICUs are frequently closed due to lack of supplies, power outages, and lack of access to clean water. A 2019 survey of nurses found that 1,557 patients died between November 2018 and February 2019 because supplies were lacking and 79 died because of power outages. These figures offer only a hint of what is happening nationwide. 

From shutterstock

Data about health conditions in Venezuela is difficult to find, however a 2017 report showed that maternal mortality increased by 66 percent and infant mortality by 30 percent between 2015 and 2016. Further, data from the WHO demonstrate that previously controlled and eliminated diseases, including some easily preventable through vaccines, have reemerged. Venezuela recorded a single case of measles between 2008 and 2015, but more than 9,900 cases have been reported since 2017. Similarly, the country recorded no cases of diphtheria between 2006 and 2015, but more than 2,800 cases have been reported since 2016. 

Lack of access to food and health care are primary drivers behind the Venezuelan  refugee crisis, but these are not the only factors at play. Many Venezuelans are fleeing the collapse of basic human services, access to education, and rising violence. An increasing number of Venezuelans are fleeing political persecution.This emergency has become much more intense because of COVID-19. While COVID-19 initially brought refugees back to Venezuela, shortages of fuel, electricity and clean water led to riots and renewed emigration in the fall of 2020.

As of December 2021, more than 6 million Venezuelans had left their homes, with approximately 5 million of them remaining in other countries in Latin America.  Since 2014, the number of Venezuelans applying for refugee status has increased 8,000%. Accord to the UN, fewer than 145,000 Venezuelans have received refugee status.  Almost 800,000 have asylum claims pending.

Emigration numbers as of July 2020

Approximately 2 million Venezuelans have entered Ecuador since 2015, most of whom have traveled onward to Peru or other countries. However, there are 520,000 Venezuelan refugees and migrants who would like to stay in Ecuador. This influx has occurred during a challenging period for Ecuador due to economic difficulties, which have been exacerbated by falling oil prices and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The arrival of so many people in a short period of time has strained Ecuador’s capacity to provide basic humanitarian support and services.

Photo from elmurcurio.com

Ecuador’s response has been inconsistent.  Historically, Ecuador has welcomed refugees and maintains paths to citizenship for refugees. Ecuador has some of the most progressive human rights, migration, and asylum laws in the region. These laws include its 2017 Human Mobility Law, which enshrines a strongly principled approach to regularizing the status of refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants. The law also commits Ecuador to the principle of non-discrimination and integration. However, the recent large influx of Venezuelan refugees has caused shifts in public opinion and a spike in xenophobia that have undermined the law, preventing Venezuelans from accessing their rights. As a result, despite the country’s legal framework, access to services and legal status is now one of the primary challenges facing Venezuelans in Ecuador.

Ecuador’s economy and society could benefit from supporting Venezuelan refugees. In a recent World Bank study, most Venezuelan migrants and refugees in Ecuador were found to be highly educated people, who could raise the country’s GDP if they have access to jobs and income corresponding to their educational level. The study also identified the main constraints to making this a reality: obtaining legal migratory or refugee status and the documents needed to certify the studies completed.  Another key challenge is school enrollment: over 50 percent of school-aged migrants and refugees do not attend school, mainly because of the costs involved, such as for materials or transportation, and because of the lack of identification documents.

From UNHCR.org

  The reality for Venezuelan refugees living in Ecuador is bleak. Basic needs such as food, shelter, and health care are frequently not being met. A recent study found that among Venezuelan refugees and migrants in Ecuador, at least 87% are food insecure, 53% lack shelter and 62% lack documentation or are awaiting processing of their asylum cases. 

This crisis is not going unnoticed.  There are governmental organizations and NGOs that are working hard towards a brighter future for Venezuelan refugees in Ecuador. Two that we have found in Cuenca and are volunteering with are the Cuenca Soup Kitchen and GRACE health clinic. Originally the Cuenca Soup Kitchen served lunch five times a week to refugees. When the meal service was halted due to COVID-19, the program was redesigned into food assistance program with food bags prepared and distributed every week, allowing the food to reach 750 people. In addition to food, the Cuenca Soup Kitchen provides donated clothing and household items to families in need. Each family is screened and followed by a social worker. As they reach stability they are transitioned out of the program, making room for others in need. The Cuenca Soup Kitchen is committed to education and reduction of environmental impact and is launching a women’s health program. 

Volunteers putting together food bags

GRACE is a health clinic founded and run by refugees and refugee advocates. GRACE consists of a network of doctors who offer routine appointments, medications, and referrals as needed free of charge to refugees. GRACE is unique in that it’s core mission is to foster and support the competency of those they are helping. Refugees fully staff the medical clinic and are found on the board of directors.  GRACE fully believes in the power and dignity of refugees helping refugees.

The Grace team

    We have decided to support these two organizations with our time and money. If you would like to make a contribution, no matter how small, it would be greatly appreciated and go to the important work of improving the lives of Venezuelan refugees living in Ecuador. 

Make a donation to the Cuenca soup kitchen: https://www.cuencasoupkitchen.org/

Make a donation to GRACE: https://giverefugeesachance.org/

Resources:

reliefweb.org

International organization for migration: www.iom.int

UN Refugee agency: www.unhcr.org

acapas.org