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Today @Reuters published my story on one aspect of how corruption has crippled Venezuela's development. We look at how a Chinese state firm allegedly bribed its way into a multi-billion dollar contract and left millions of intended recipients hungry: 1/10 reut.rs/2H4Xm8R
Since 2007, Venezuela and China have agreed to hundreds of projects meant to improve access to food, power and water. I visited Chinese projects in Delta Amacuro, Guárico and Monagas states aimed at boosting food production. Little work was done. Farming is moribund. 2/10 
One $200 mln project by China's CAMC in Delta Amacuro was meant to build Latin America's largest rice plant and develop 11,000 hectares of rice fields to provide food and jobs to locals. “Rice Power! Agricultural power!” Hugo Chávez tweeted when it was announced in 2010. 3/10
The plant was inaugurated in Feb but our reporting shows the project hasn’t yielded a single grain of locally grown rice. The half-built plant is running at 1% capacity, processing rice imported from Brazil. The other half is rusting in containers. The fields are undeveloped 4/10
“There’s not a gram of rice growing anywhere here,” said one farmer, living by the plant. “It seemed like a revolutionary idea ... Now we’re starving.” (Photo of a clogged irrigation canal on his land) 5/10
Yet CAMC and Venezuelan partners prospered. In Andorra, I obtained sealed case files showing how Chinese firms paid to secure projects they often didn’t complete. For its agriculture projects CAMC earned at least $1.4 bln, project docs show. 6/10
CAMC paid over $100 mln to its Venezuelan partners, per the court docs. The result, prosecutors allege, was a culture of kickbacks in which well-connected Venezuelan intermediaries milked projects meant to develop neglected areas. (Photo of unsown rice field in Guárico) 7/10
"If all these projects were truly working, people would be eating. But they're not," opposition lawmaker Larissa González, who represents Delta Amacuro, told me. (Photo of Tucupita locals protesting lack of cooking gas) 8/10
We also looked at six Chinese-built power plants intended to provide electricity to entire Venezuelan states. Per sources, none of these plants became fully operational, leaving towns near them subject to regular blackouts that now leave millions in the dark 9/10
CAMC told us the case files include “a large number of inaccuracies" and said it "strives to complete every construction project." Sinohydro did not comment. China's Foreign Ministry told us cooperation with Venezuela would continue. 10/10
Many thanks to @pauloprada for editing and the wonderful photos for the story are by @Manaurevzla.
