Transnational mining corporations bringing in workers from outside El Callao to do jobs which cooperatives can do!

Government-backed cooperatives in El Callao are claiming that transnational mining corporations are bringing in workers from outside the area to do jobs for which their members are full trained.

Sergenepiar cooperative spokesman Julio Hernandez says that they are running out of jobs in El Callao where small businesses are not being contracted by the transnationals.

"We have to protect local employment opportunities; for example I have the machinery but I have to work hard to get work since these companies bring in people from Puerto Ordaz. They are throwing aside dozens of cooperatives that must now leave the community to make ends meet, to feed their families."

Hernandez is calling on local authorities and businesses to take the small cooperatives into account and give them jobs rather than the outsiders.