No parking!

On 21 March Coca-Cola Femsa agreed to hand over a parking lot, that was used as a distribution centre, to the Venezuelan government, two weeks after President Chavez demanded the company relinquish the space.

According to local media, the Coca-Cola distribution centre, which supplies western Caracas, has been running since 1992, and employs 300 workers. Coca-Cola FEMSA will have three, possibly extended to four, months to find land of the same size in order to continue operating. The government will assist with the necessary procedures for buying that land and constructing the storehouses.

Once Coca-Cola FEMSA has cleared the flat plot, the government plans to build housing and a medical centre there.

Venezuela’s leftist nationalist government currently pursues a scheme of appropriating flat land within Caracas that is used for automobile graveyards, factories or businesses that could function perfectly well on the city’s outskirts. Flat land is in short supply in crowded and hilly Caracas.

Coca-Cola FEMSA is the biggest soft drink company in Latin America. In Venezuela, FEMSA employs 8,000 workers, operates four plants and 32 distribution centres and pays some USD 140 million per year in taxes, according to figures provided by the firm.

Relations between the Coca-Cola bottler and the Venezuelan government have been strained for some time. Twice last year FEMSA’s operations were blocked by picketers over a labour dispute.