Cuidad Guayana, Venezuela - Emiliano Veria searches through knee-high piles of garbage, in a dump that stretches to the horizon.

It's a daily fight between him, scores of other scavengers and carrion birds. Amid smouldering waste, the pickers look for metals and clothes to sell. Alongside the vultures, they hunt for food to eat.

"It's not better here than elsewhere, but I can't find work and I have no money. The little I find here is to buy food. If not, I have nothing. Nothing here, no work," Veria said.

The 29-year-old has been working at Cambalache - on the edge of Ciudad Guayana in Venezuela's eastern Bolivar State - for more than a year, usually for three months at a time.