A healthy diet is often discussed as a top public health issue, but affordability remains one of its biggest barriers.

Over the past decade, food prices have climbed due to inflation, supply chain disruptions, and climate-related shocks. At the same time, incomes and food access have improved in many regions.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Niccolo Conte, highlights how these competing forces have shaped the global cost of eating well—and who is still being left behind.

The data for this visualization comes from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. It tracks the average daily cost of a healthy diet worldwide.

Healthy Diet Costs Are Rising

A healthy diet is defined as providing 2,330 kilocalories per day, with nutritionally adequate proportions across six food groups. These include starchy staples, vegetables, fruits, animal-source foods, legumes, nuts and seeds, and oils and fats.

In 2017, the average global cost of a healthy diet was $3.14 per person per day. By 2024, that figure had climbed to $4.46. The sharpest increases occurred after 2020, coinciding with pandemic-related disruptions and global food price inflation.

Affordability Is Improving Despite Higher Prices

While costs have risen, affordability has steadily improved. In 2017, 38.4% of the global population—about 2.93 billion people—could not afford a healthy diet. By 2024, that share had fallen to 31.9%, representing roughly 2.6 billion people.

Despite global progress, affordability challenges remain concentrated in low-income and conflict-affected regions. Even small increases in food prices can have outsized effects where households already spend a large share of income on food.

If you enjoyed today’s post, check out How Much Meat do We Eat? on Voronoi, the new app from Visual Capitalist.

Authored by Pepe Escobar,

So the Big Oil Picture in Venezuela is way more complex than the Trump 2.0 gang suspects…

Let’s start with neo-Caligula’s new edicts on the imperial satrapy he says he now owns; not exactly edicts but outright threats directed to interim President Delcy Rodriguez:

Crack down on “drug trafficking flows”. Well, this should actually be directed to Colombian and Mexican smugglers in cahoots with big American buyers.

Expel Iranian, Cuban, and other “operatives hostile to Washington” – before Caracas is allowed to increase oil production. Not happening.

Halt oil sales to “US adversaries”. Not happening.

Hence it becomes a near certainty that neo-Caligula may bomb Venezuela again.

Neo-Caligula, in a separate motormouth offensive, also clarified that he wants to somewhat overhaul the oil business in Venezuela via subsidies. It “could take less than 18 months”; then it morphed to “we can do it in less time than that, but it’ll be a lot of money”; and finally morphed to “a tremendous amount of money will have to be spent and the oil companies will spend it.”

No, they won’t, as several proverbial “industry insiders” have advanced. US energy majors balk at the sight of investing fortunes in a nation that may be engulfed by total chaos if neo-Caligula forces a traitorous government over 28 million people.

According to Rystad Energy Analysis, it would take no less than 16 years and at least $183 billion for Venezuela to produce a mere 3 million barrels of oil a day.

Neo-Caligula’s ultimate dream is to reduce global oil prices to a maximum $50 a barrel. For this purpose, the Trump 2.0 imperial gig will, in thesis, totally control PDVSA, including acquisition and sale of virtually all of its oil production.

US Energy Secretary Chris Wright, at a Goldman Sachs energy conference, let the oily cat out of the bag:

“We are going to market the crude coming out of Venezuela, first this backed up stored oil [up to 50 million barrels], and then infinitely, going forward, we will sell the production that comes out of Venezuela into the marketplace.”

So essentially the neo-Caligula gig will capture, actually steal the sale of crude from PDVSA, with the money theoretically deposited in US-controlled offshore accounts to “benefit the Venezuelan people”.

There’s no way Delcy Rodriguez’s interim government will accept what amounts to de facto theft. Even as Homeland Security Advisor Stephen Miller is bragging that the US is using “military threat” to maintain control of Venezuela. If you are really in control, you don’t need to issue threats.

So what about China?

China was importing roughly 746,000 barrels of oil a day from Venezuela. That’s not much. Beijing is already working on replacing it with imports from Iran. China essentially is not dependent on Venezuelan oil. Apart from Iran, it may also source from Russia and Saudi Arabia.

Beijing clearly sees that the imperial overdrive in the Western Hemisphere and in West Asia is not just about oil, but also to force China to buy energy with petrodollars. Nonsense: with Russia, the Persian Gulf and beyond, the name of the game is already petroyuan.

China is 80% energy independent. Venezuela de facto was accounting for a mere 2% of the 20% China imports – and this according to the US government’s own numbers.

China’s energy relationship with Venezuela goes way beyond cheap American formulas. Here is essentially outlined how “Chinese oil agreements with Venezuela are de facto binding financial contracts, with repayment mechanisms, collateral structures, penalty clauses, and derivative linkages embedded deep into global finance (…) They are connected – directly and indirectly – to Western financial institutions, commodity traders, insurers, and clearing systems, including entities tied to Wall Street. If these contracts are broken, the consequence is not China ‘taking a loss’. It is a cascade event: defaults triggering counterparty exposure, derivatives being repriced, legal disputes crossing jurisdictions, and confidence shock spreading outward. At a certain point, this ceases to be a Venezuelan problem and becomes a systemic global one.”

Moreover, “over the past twenty years, China has become the operational core of Venezuela’s oil industry. Not merely as a buyer, but as a builder. China provided refinery technology, heavy crude upgrading systems, infrastructure design, control software, spare parts logistics (…) Remove the Chinese engineers. Remove the technicians who understand the control logic. Remove the maintenance supply chains. Remove the software support. What remains is not a functioning oil industry waiting to be ‘liberated’, but an inert shell.”

Conclusion: “Converting Venezuela’s Chinese-built oil sector into an American one would take three to five years, minimum.”

Financial analyst Lucas Ekwame hits the major points. Venezuela produces superheavy oil as thick as tar. It doesn’t just flow; it needs to be melted to reach the surface, and after extraction, it hardens again, requiring diluent: no less than 0.3 barrels of diluent need to be imported for each exported barrel.

Compound it with Venezuela’s energy infrastructure shaped by China and at the same time suffering years of American sanctions, even worse than over Iraq in the early 2000s, and neo-Caligula’s faulty oil “strategy” becomes obvious.

That of course does not alter the short-term feast of imperial hedge fund vultures over Venezuela’s carcass, starting with ghastly Paul Singer, the billionaire Zionist hedge fund manager and MAGA super PAC donor ($42 million in 2024) whose Elliott Management acquired the Houston-based subsidiary of CITGO for $5.9 billion in November, less than a third of its $18 billion market value, thanks to the embargo on Venezuelan oil imports.

The speculative money crowd is bound to cash in on up to $170 billion in the debt market; defaulted PDVSA bonds alone are worth over $60 billion.

So the Big Oil Picture in Venezuela is way more complex than the Trump 2.0 gang suspects. Of course on the road ahead we may come to a situation where the Viceroy of Venezuela, the gusano Marco Rubio, cuts off the oil flow from Caracas to Shanghai. Well, considering Rubio’s strategic “expertise”, better start regimenting battalions of lawyers right away.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.

Silver prices surged more than 5% in recent trading, breaking above $80 per ounce once again.

The rally has been driven by China’s restrictions on silver exports, rising demand from green technologies like solar power, and renewed interest in safe-haven assets.

This visualization, via Visual Capitalist’s Bruno Venditti, highlights the world’s largest silver-producing countries and shows where global supply is most concentrated.

The data for this visualization comes from the U.S. Geological Survey’s Mineral Commodity Summaries 2025. It presents estimated silver mine production by country for 2024.

Mexico’s Production Dominance

Total world silver production reached roughly 25,000 metric tons in 2024.

Mexico remained the world’s top silver producer in 2024, with an estimated 6,300 metric tons of output. The country has held this position for decades, supported by extensive mining infrastructure and high-grade deposits. Notably, Mexico produces far more silver than its reserve share might suggest, holding only about 6% of the world’s known reserves.

China and Peru Anchor Global Supply

China ranked second globally, producing around 3,300 metric tons of silver in 2024. Much of this output comes as a byproduct of large-scale base metal mining, particularly lead and zinc.

Peru followed closely with approximately 3,100 metric tons, reinforcing South America’s importance in global silver markets.

Together, these three countries accounted for more than half of global silver production.

Beyond the top producers, countries such as Bolivia, Poland, Chile, Russia, and the United States each produced between 1,100 and 1,300 metric tons. Australia, Kazakhstan, Argentina, and India also contributed meaningful volumes.

Despite this diversity, the silver market remains tight. Strong demand from solar panels, electronics, and electrification is expected to keep the market in a deficit, putting upwards pressure on silver prices.

If you enjoyed today’s post, check out All of the World’s Oil Reserves by Country, in One Visualization on Voronoi, the new app from Visual Capitalist.

Authored by Mollie Engelhart via The Epoch Times,

California was my home for most of my adult life—long enough to know that what looks good in a campaign slogan can feel very different when you’re the one carrying the load.

I built restaurants there. I employed people there. I signed permits, licenses, and applications like they were holiday cards. I navigated agencies that asked for more paperwork than profit statements. I paid into a system that always wanted one more filing, one more inspection, one more approval, one more fee. The joke was that my assistant didn’t work in hospitality—she worked in compliance. And it was true. That state turns compliance into a profession.

So when I see the latest proposal—a one-time 5 percent tax on anyone whose net worth exceeds $1 billion—I don’t see Robin Hood. I see Sacramento writing itself a permission slip.

The pitch says “billionaires.” But the mechanism says “total assessed wealth, declared by the owner, verified by the state, and enforceable through audit.”

That’s a power move, not a nuance.

A Tax Based on Valuation, Not Reality

Most taxes in America hit earnings or consumption. You pay when you make money, or when you buy something, or when you sell something. This proposal taxes accumulation. It doesn’t ask what you can afford. It asks what you have, and then hands a calculator to the agencies to determine the bill.

We’ve seen how this evolves. The Biden administration and Vice President Kamala Harris already proposed a federal wealth tax on Americans worth $100 million or more. Not billionaires—$100 million. That’s a signal flare, not a footnote.

It tells you exactly what you need to know: This idea isn’t anchored at the top. It’s already drifting toward the middle.

And middle is where most of the money actually lives.

The Constitution Saw This Coming

There’s a phrase from constitutional law that gets thrown around a lot in conversations like this: bill of attainder.

A bill of attainder is a law that punishes a specific person or small identifiable group without a trial, skipping the courts and due process entirely. In the United States, that kind of law is unconstitutional—lawmakers don’t get to play judge and jury and penalize a select group through legislation alone.

This proposal isn’t a criminal punishment, but the reason people bring the term up at all is because it targets a tiny group by valuation for a massive extraction event without a court proceeding first. That resemblance matters if you believe fairness isn’t optional.

The Wealthy Already Pay Plenty—Just Quietly

People talk about the “rich dodging taxes” like it’s gospel. Let me tell you what actually happens when you build something in California:

You don’t dodge taxes, you drown in them. Not just income tax, not just property tax, but sales tax, alcoholic beverage tax, payroll taxes, employer-side filings, permits, licensing fees, inspections, regulatory approvals, environmental health certificates, building permits, land use permits, and on and on and on.

That state has already been collecting revenue from business owners in every direction long before this proposal ever landed on the ballot.

If you want to know why business owners left, it wasn’t a lack of patriotism. It was math.

The Trojan Horse Isn’t the Billionaire—It’s the Precedent

The billionaires are the branding. The mascot. The costume the idea wears so voters don’t inspect the gears.

But the gears are what matter, because once a state passes a tax on total assessed wealth, future thresholds can be lowered, exemptions can be rewritten, valuation formulas can be expanded, and enforcement will land in the hands of agencies most voters will never meet—but business owners never stop meeting.

The real question is not “Should billionaires pay more?” but “Should the state have the right to tax total assessed wealth at all?”

Because once that precedent exists, the definition of “rich” will keep shifting, the net will keep widening, and the bill will keep climbing down the balance sheet toward the people who never imagined they’d qualify.

A millionaire today in California is someone who owns a house. A house today costs a million dollars there. That’s not a billionaire. That’s a math teacher and a firefighter and a family with a mortgage.

The net will widen because the money they need is not all at the top. There’s much more sitting in the middle.

And middle-class is where precedent always ends up grazing.

My Stance

I lean libertarian—I don’t want government in every aspect of our lives, our kitchens, our land, or our asset valuations. I’m a hard no on expanding its discretion any further. The slogans may be sticky, but freedoms are stickier—once lost, they don’t come back.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.