Price controls and scarcity force Venezuelans to turn to the black market for milk and toilet paper

From those struggling to meet inflated prices for everyday goods, to lawyers turned pasta smugglers, the street economy flourishes under President Maduro

In Petare, a giant slum overlooking Caracas from the east, hustlers known as buhoneros sell their goods at a busy intersection. "I've got milk, toilet paper, coffee, soap"" said 30-year-old Carmen Rodriguez, pointing to her wares by the side of a road busy with honking motorbikes, cars and buses. "Of course they cost more than the government say they should. We have to queue up to get them or buy them from someone who has done. We're helping people get the basics."

Yet, many of the poor simply can't afford Rodriguez's basics. In a raw and arguably necessary display of capitalism, she sells them for far more than the government's legally required "fair prices". It is ironically because of those government-imposed fair prices that the goods often aren't available at supermarkets at fair prices as it's simply not profitable to import them. This is thanks to economic policies dating back more than a decade.

Of course my goods cost more than the government say they should. We're helping people get the basics

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Children walk across the bridge to Colombia with Coca-Cola bottles filled with petrol

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