Ecobreves – VENEZUELA: Much-Feared Duckweed Generates Income

By IPS Correspondents and - - Reprint | | Print |

CARACAS, Sep 2 2006 (IPS) - Three resident cooperatives in the San Luis neighborhood of Maracaibo, Venezuela's second largest city, located on the lake of the same name, have obtained up to 5,000 dollars per day for harvesting lemna sp, the much-feared water lentil, or duckweed, that has taken over the lake's surface. “In one day we collect 2,060 baskets, and 13 are needed for a cubic meter. But it's worth it because they pay us 73,000 bolivares (34 dollars) per meter. Here, one of every two people is unemployed,” Judith Iriarte, a member of the harvesting group, told Tierramérica.

The duckweed covers 4.36 percent of the lake's 13,000 square-km surface, according to Environment Minister Jacqueline Farías, “but we hope to defeat it by the end of 2006, with a decrease in contamination and manual collection, for which we are not hiring staff but rather paying by the meter, which allows an entire family to work.”