Oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq) is a species of great use in the production of oil and biofuels. Large plantations of this crop have resulted in bringing about conditions favorable for diseases development. Anthracnose is one of the diseases most important in the nursery and young plantations. This disease appeared at 2008 on 300 hectares of oil palm plantation and located on the farm “La Trinidad”, in the Rio Frio area under the jurisdiction of municipalities Caracciolo Parra y Olmedo, among Merida, Sucre and Zulia states. Anthracnose was observed on leaves and stems and causing rot and fall of the palm fruit. The purpose of this work was to identify causal agent of disease, through the microscopic identification of the pathogen structures, including a description of its shape and size, the morphological characterization based on evaluation macroscopic (colony diameter, growth rate, growth pattern, type and color of mycelium), and molecular characterization based on the analysis of the sequences of the ITS1-5.8S-ITS2 of ribosomal DNA (rDNA) with universal primers to fungi and specific for the possible Colletotrichum species identified morphologically. In addition, the levels of genetic variability of the pathogen were identified through the use of techniques: Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism (RFLP) and Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD). We confirmed the pathogenicity of the causal agent of anthracnose through Koch’s postulates on fruits and young oil palm plants established in the field. Fifty (50) isolates of the pathogen from different tissues of oil palm plants were identified as Colletotrichum gloeosporioides and variability analysis showed that the study population had a predominantly clonal structure, although some isolates were found with significant levels of variation with respect to the main population.