(Reuters) – Venezuelan state-run oil firm PDVSA will cut office hours for its administrative workers, an internal document seen by Reuters showed, following an energy-saving order by the government amid a worsening power crisis.
The administration of President Nicolas Maduro announced on Sunday that government offices would cut their hours to half as reduced generation of hydro electricity and a lack of enough fuel to feed thermoelectric plants was leading to longer power cuts in some regions.
As part of the government’s plan, PDVSA told employees in an internal note on Friday to work from administrative offices three times a week and work from home the remaining days until further notice, aiming to reduce the company’s power consumption.
“We order all vice presidencies, executive divisions and administrative offices to implement the energy saving plan in a progressive and coordinated way,” the document says, adding that operational areas to produce oil and gas, refineries and trading activities would not be affected.
The South American country, which in the last decades has faced episodes of severe fuel scarcity and power crisis, is bracing for the possibility of more severe measures by the United States following the imposition of secondary tariffs to importers of Venezuelan oil this week.
(Reporting by Marianna Parraga and Mircely Guanipa; Editing by Leslie Adler and Mark Porter)
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