In spite the severe economic and financial troubles the country has suffered during the last decade, Venezuela continues to be one of the foremost economic leaders of the region, with a very solid democratic system of government and a dynamic market representing a truly guarantee for national and foreign investments.

The potencial of Venezuela’s economy is great. In fact, the country has many economic advantages: its longstanding democracy, a highly open and profitable oil and gas industries, a stable judicial floor and a wealth of many other natural resources. The present government is determined to work hard in the way to give a long leap to the Venezuela’s economy.

The structure of the Venezuelan economy is based in two main concepts: First it is a mixed economy with extensive public and private participation. Second, it is divided into two fundamental components: the oil economy, oriented toward exporting, and the internal economy, where most of the country’s goods and services are produced and consumed. During the coming years, non oil economic activity will be concentrated in agriculture and industry, which are the two sectors most seriously affected by import competition.

The new economic policy has several basic objectives: one is to reorient industry toward areas in which Venezuela has comparative advantages, by reallocating resources away from uncompetitive activities, which are now discouraged. Enhancement of productive efficiency and product quality are the key policy goals. This reorientation should reduce the Venezuelan economy’s dependence on single export product the domestic demand for which is growing steadily, and lead to a diversification of exports to include more manufactured goods.

In this way, is very important to stress that Venezuela’s business environment is one of the most open in Latin America. Starting in 1989, the country’s economy has undergone a progressive liberalization. Today, the country offers to investors low tariffs and competitive tax rates. Investment opportunities have steadily grown with new legislation designed to attract foreign investment and promote increased private sector activity.

Other market-oriented reforms have included a reworking of the country’s banking and insurance laws and of its social security system, provisions improving protection for intellectual property rights, and growing private-sector participation in the country’s strategic industries such as oil and gas.

There is no capital repatriation limitation, no profit transfer limitation, and no prior authorization requirement for investment in the economy. Foreign companies are not treated any differently from their domestic counterparts. Foreign companies’ investments can include trademarks, patents and other technical known as a capital contribution.

Venezuela affords protection to investors; its membership in the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) means that investors are shielded from political risk. Venezuela has also joined the World Bank’s Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agreement (MIGA), which provides similar protection to any foreign investors.

Furthermore, as it was said before, Venezuela is among the most politically stable countries in Latin America, with a democratic tradition spanning more than 40 years. Venezuela continues its democratic system, adopting recently a new and modern National Constitution voted by means of a popular referendum.

In relation to the improvement of the Venezuelan economy, the country has pretty good physical infra-structure, having an electronic network modernizing and expanding each year. Telecommunications have developed quickly since the sector have been widely open to the private national and international investments. The national government is now determined to impulse and promote no traditional exports in the way to capture major flow of investment toward the country. For this reason has been working hard in the negotiations of new zones of free commerce to open new spaces for the Venezuelan goods and services. At the same time, the country’s government has been removing obstacles and making the necessary judicial floor to allow to re-establish the trust among the members of the national and international business community.

It is well known that Venezuela houses an extraordinary land of the most beautiful and varied landscapes: High mountains ranges of the Andes, with lovely "Paramos" and an enormous diversity of settings; the colourful extensive central plains or "Llanos"; the varied and impressive sceneries of the Guayana region, with its huge and mysterious high tablelands or "Tepuyes" with the most abundant and spectacular water falls in the world; the beautiful and varied beaches of the Caribbean Sea. But the wonders are not only limited to its landscapes or its flora, but also to the country’s fauna, ideal, for instance, for eco-tourism, as Venezuela has a bird life considered to be among the most attractive in the world.

Really, Venezuela, more than any other country has more advantages and attractions for tourists without equal for travellers, and lovers of adventure and nature. As currently overseas people said: "Heterogeneous and full of contrast, enigmatic and magic, located precisely in the middle of the New World, this is a place where everything is still waiting to be discovered".

In Venezuela, within an area so close, the country offers to travellers beaches and snow, sun and shade, forests and plains, mountains and sea, desert and rivers, pure nature at its best, full of solicitude and mystery. "Columbus anticipated this from the beginning when he first set foot on the American Continent in 1498. In front of the Coast of Venezuela, he believed he had come upon paradise on earth and called the new world "The Land of Grace".

Investors have found good opportunities in all sectors of the Venezuelan economy. These are the cases of the today’s opened oil industry, for instance, or in the telecommunications sector which is now totally open to national and international investors. In this last sector are competing without any kind of restriction companies as Genesis, Veninfotel, New Com, Telcel Bell South, Supercable, Telecom, Mobile, CANTV, etc.

In oil and gas sectors participate the major oil and gas companies of the world. After the economic liberalization experimented in the last years, the range of investors widened in a great variety of the economy sectors, having a growing interest in the Venezuelan stock exchange. In this way, foreign investment in oil, insurance and baking is growing steadily from 1996. The same has happened in agriculture, mining, commerce, transportation and warehousing. Telecommunications seems to be the most attractive sector for foreign investment, due not only to the growth of services but also to the expansion of the already existing concessions. The financial and insurance sectors, as well as tourism also represent mayor potential areas for investment.

Agriculture