Rabbit drive becomes a pet project

Nicolas Maduro, the Venezuelan President, has admitted his plan to combat the country’s food crisis by encouraging people to breed rabbits for meat has hit an early “setback” after participants in a pilot project started to adopt the animals as pets.

Unveiling “Plan Rabbit”, Maduro described it as an “extremely good” initiative to provide an alternative source of animal protein, “because rabbits breed like . . . rabbits”.

However, the scheme, designed to resist the “economic war” Maduro says is being waged by the “empire”, has suffered teething difficulties.

Freddy Bernal, the Minister for Urban Agriculture, had given baby