[Venezuelanalysis.com editor Gregory Wilpert reports on the announcement made last month by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez that his government would like to introduce local currencies in communities,
so as to help their development and to alleviate poverty. Chavez said such currencies “can improve life and above all for the
construction of a new social, economic, and political system” by
creating an “alternative system of commerce.” --Ed] 
Venezuelan President
Hugo Chavez at a Center for ideological formation, where he announced
the idea of introducing local currencies in Venezuela. Credit: ABN
Venezuela to Introduce Local Currencies
By Gregory Wilpert – Venezuelanalysis.com
March 30, 2007
Caracas, March 30, 2007 (venezuelanalysis.com)— Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez said yesterday that his government would like to introduce local currencies in communities, so as to help their development and to alleviate poverty. Local currencies would allow people to exchange goods and services without needing the national currency to enable such transactions.
Chavez said such currencies “can improve life and above all for the construction of a new social, economic, and political system” by creating an “alternative system of commerce.” Such systems have been applied in many places, according to Chavez, such as “in northern Brazil and in some localities of Mexico.”
Such as system would allow “the poor to possibility of acquiring products via exchange with an intermediary currency that could circulate, for example, in a determinate territory or would have validity for a determinate time,” explained Chavez.
The implementation of local currencies would require a set of rules, said Chavez, which could be passed as a law-decree, under the enabling law, according to which Chavez may pass law-decrees for 18 months, beginning in January of this year. Chavez asked Vice-President Jorge Rodriguez to present a law proposal for this project.
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