Colombia replaces 75 % of the trade lost in Venezuela

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Colombia has now replaced about 75 % of the exports they used to send to Venezuela, by hiking their exports to other nations, such as China and the USA. Thus the Colombian economy is doing rather well, with GDP growth projected to be about 3,5 % this year (versus about a 4 to 5 % drop predicted for Venezuela). In spite of Venezuela's politically inspired embargo, the Colombians continue to sell natural gas into Western Venezuela, where acute shortages of this fuel have taken place due to PDVSA's failure to develop Venezuelan gas fields.

Thus, should Colombia go ahead and elect a candidate not to Chavez' liking (in which case Chavez has threatened a full shut down in trade), the Colombians may actually weather such an embargo much better than Venezuela. With economic growth on the positive side, and being the recipients of a lot of foreign direct investment, they can afford to shut off the gas going to Venezuela, which will cause a huge crisis in Zulia state. Colombia, with a much larger population, a democratically elected president, a growing economy, and US support to defeat the FARC, is likely to become the gorilla of northern Latin America.

Venezuela, on the other hand, has an economic meltdown going on, with government policies encouraging even more problems, a serious lack of electricity with rolling blackouts continuing even though the rainy season has started, the highest inflation rate in Latin America, and an absolute lack of real foreign investment - companies are warily sitting on the fence, signing deals but refusing to invest for now due to the government's marxist and radical nationalization stance.