Amid rows of softly humming sewing machines, with women calmly chatting among themselves as they go about their work, Margarita Morales picks up one of the bright red T-shirts from the production line.
"We're making these for people to wear at pro-government rallies," she says cheerfully, revealing a room stacked with T-shirts emblazoned with slogans such as "With Chávez, the people rule" and with images of Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara, as well as piles of military uniforms. This small Venezuela Advances factory in Catia, a poor district in the west of Caracas, is one of Venezuela's showcase co-operatives, at the frontline of President Hugo Chávez's "Bolivarian revolution". Measures to promote such outposts of a 'socialist economy' are one of the central planks of the changes Mr Chávez hopes to introduce to the constitution, expected to be approved in a referendum on December 2.
