Following the abduction of Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro final week, the administration of US President Donald Trump has acknowledged that it desires to rapidly restore the nation’s oil manufacturing and increase its mining sector.
“You will have metal, you might have minerals, all of the crucial minerals, they’ve nice mining historical past that’s gone rusty,” US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick informed reporters on Sunday from aboard Air Pressure One. “President Trump goes to repair it and produce it again.”
So, what reserves and sources does Venezuela have?
Largest recognized oil reserves
Venezuela has the world’s largest confirmed oil reserves, estimated at 303 billion barrels as of 2023, greater than 5 occasions the quantity america has, which is 55.25 billion barrels.
Venezuela can be one of many founding members of OPEC (the Group of the Petroleum Exporting Nations), having established the group in Baghdad in September 1960 alongside Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia.
Venezuela’s oil reserves are concentrated primarily within the Orinoco Belt, an unlimited area within the jap a part of the nation stretching throughout roughly 55,000 sq. kilometres (21,235 sq. miles), which is managed by Venezuela’s state-owned oil firm, Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA).
The Orinoco Belt holds extra-heavy crude oil, which is extremely viscous and dense, making it a lot more durable and costlier to extract than typical crude oil. Consequently, it sometimes sells at a reduction in comparison with lighter, sweeter crudes, comparable to these extracted from US shale.
Refining oil from this area requires superior strategies that the US possesses, significantly within the states of Texas and Louisiana.
Who buys Venezuelan oil?
Venezuela was as soon as a serious oil exporter. Within the late Nineties and early 2000s, it equipped roughly 1.5 to 2 million barrels per day to america, making it one of many US’s largest overseas oil sources.
Nevertheless, political instability, mismanagement at PDVSA, a scarcity of funding, and US sanctions on the nation’s vitality trade have led to falling manufacturing.
In 2024, Venezuela produced a median of 952,000 barrels per day (bpd), in comparison with 783,000 bpd in 2023, in response to PDVSA’s outcomes as reported by OPEC. PDVSA’s oil gross sales overseas in 2024 amounted to $17.52bn, in response to a Reuters report.
China is the biggest purchaser of Venezuelan crude oil and has been for the previous decade. In November 2025, earlier than the US army blockade started in December, Venezuela exported 952,000 barrels per day.
Of this, 778,000 barrels had been despatched to China, giving Beijing an 81.7 % share of Venezuela’s oil exports. The US is the second-largest purchaser, importing 15.8 % of Venezuelan oil; adopted by Cuba, which imported almost 2.5 %.
Pure fuel
Venezuela ranks ninth on the earth for pure fuel reserves.
In accordance with the Worldwide Vitality Company, as of 2023, Venezuela’s fuel deposits totalled round 5.5 trillion cubic metres (195 trillion cubic ft), accounting for 73 % of the entire pure fuel reserves in South America.
Most of those reserves are linked to crude oil, with round 80 % of produced pure fuel being a byproduct of oil manufacturing.
Gold
Venezuela possesses the biggest official gold reserves in Latin America.
In accordance with the World Gold Council, which screens central financial institution holdings globally, Venezuela’s reserves are roughly 161.2 metric tonnes, price greater than $23bn in at the moment’s market worth.
Venezuela can be believed to carry a number of the most vital untapped gold sources, however official knowledge is outdated.
In 2011, former President Hugo Chavez introduced the Orinoco Mining Arc, which might discover, nationalise and export metals. In February 2016, Maduro got down to additional develop the world, with 12 % of the nation marked for mining throughout a number of states. The federal government mentioned there have been diamonds, nickel, coltan and copper reserves that it might mine.
In 2018, Maduro introduced a “Gold Plan” to encourage funding in gold after signing mining offers with quite a few overseas firms price an estimated $5.5bn. Nevertheless, none of those offers materialised, and most mines have remained underneath the management of non-state armed teams.
A 2018 mineral report by Venezuela’s Ministry of Ecological Mining Improvement estimated that the nation holds a minimum of 644 metric tonnes of gold, however the Venezuelan authorities has acknowledged that the precise numbers could possibly be a lot greater.
What different minerals does Venezuela have?
The 2018 minerals catalog estimated:
- Licensed coal reserves of roughly 3 billion metric tonnes
- 14.68 billion metric tonnes of iron ore, of which 3.6 billion are confirmed
- 407,885 metric tonnes of nickel reserves
- Measured bauxite amounting to 99.4 million metric tonnes
- Reported reserves of diamonds amounting to 1,020 million carats within the Orinoco Mining Arc and 275 million carats alone within the space of Guanaimo
