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Get a boat!' Venezuela flights booked full for months If you live in Venezuela and want to fly abroad, get in line.Flights
are booked solid months in advance, not from a new interest in exotic
destinations but because locals are profiting from a play on the
nation's tightly controlled currency market.The
airline scramble has added to shortages, power cuts and runaway prices
as another symbol of the Byzantine economic challenges facing the new
government of President Nicolas Maduro in the South American OPEC
nation."It's
like you're trapped here," said travel agent Doris Gaal, telling a
customer he would be better off taking a boat to a Caribbean island
because the daily flights are fully booked. "It's all because of these
stupid dollars!"After
a decade of currency controls set up by late socialist leader Hugo
Chavez in 2003, the disparity between the official and black-market
rates for the local bolivar currency is higher than ever. Greenbacks now
sell on the illegal market at about seven times the government price of
6.3 to the dollar.There
are strict limits on the availability of dollars at the 6.3 rate, but
Venezuelans are cashing in on a special currency provision for
travelers. With a valid airline ticket, Venezuelans may exchange up to
$3,000 at the government rate.Some are not even flying, leaving many planes half empty."It is possible to travel abroad for free due to this exchange rate magic," said local economist Angel Garcia Banchs.The profit is realized from an arbitrage process known locally as "el raspao," or "the scrape."Credit
cards are used abroad to get a cash advance -- rather than buying
merchandise. The dollars are then carried back into Venezuela and sold
on the black market for some seven times the original exchange rate.The large profit margin easily absorbs the cost of flights and accommodation for a trip."I've
been able to buy new clothes and give some cash to all my closest
family members!" said one delighted Venezuelan lady, just back from a
trip to Europe."It
was really easy. There was a guy in a hotel room with 10 point-of-sale
machines who swiped my card for $1,000 each day," said a Venezuelan
pensioner, also asking not to be named as he described his trip to a
Caribbean island.CARACAS-TO-CARACASSome
Venezuelans do not even bother leaving the country, but merely send
their credit cards to friends overseas, who swipe the cards and send the
cash back to Venezuela."This
is the reason many airlines are sending half-empty planes," Ricardo
Cusanno, head of a local tourism council, told Reuters, saying the
government should cross-reference flight lists with those requesting
foreign exchange to outwit the no-shows.As a result of the high level of unused seats, some airlines are beginning to overbook at much higher rates than usual.As well as perplexing the industry, the scramble for tickets has become a hot topic of conversation and humor on the street.The
nation's leading satirical website, Chiguire Bipolar (Bipolar Capybara,
a Venezuelan version of U.S. comic website The Onion), ran a
tongue-in-cheek story of a new airline route: from Caracas to Caracas.The
spoof round-trip flight would let passengers nibble on snacks as they
leave Venezuelan airspace, swipe their cards to obtain "illicit dollars
quickly and securely," and make even more profit by buying duty-free
goods to sell at home."Raspao" was now the "most dynamic sector" of the country's economy, the story added.Not everyone sees the humour in the situation.The
currency controls that Chavez implemented have exacerbated some of the
very problems they were meant to address: inflation and capital flight
from the country.The
lack of dollars has left importers struggling to pay for basic items
that range from toilet paper to bread and wine for church masses.It is also fueling the highest price rises in the Americas, 45 percent in the last year.For
critics of the government, the phenomenon of sold-out flights is a
symbol of excessive interference and economic mismanagement during the
last 14 years of socialist rule.For
Maduro and his team, it is symptomatic of unscrupulous and greedy
capitalist opponents who are "sabotaging" Venezuela's economy in order
to sink him.Maduro recently set up a new telephone hotline, 0-800-SABOTAGE, for Venezuelans to report illegal economic activity.Adding
to the frenetic demand for plane tickets is the low cost of flights -
when they are available - for those with hard currency that they have
changed on the black market.This has turned Caracas into an informal hub for frequent fliers across the region."People from all over Latin America come here to buy flights using black market money," said Gaal, the travel agent.Given the high demand, at least one foreign airline is looking to expand in Venezuela."We
have requested authorization for additional services but have not
received a response," said Martha Pantin, a spokeswoman for American
Airlines, which has 48 flights every week in and out of Venezuela.Back at her travel agency in a wealthy Caracas neighborhood, Gaal lamented her inability to serve customers."I'll see you on the boat!" she quipped.
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