Business & Economy

Brazil is weighing granting the construction company Odebrecht a $150 million credit to remodel airport terminals in Havana and other Cuban cities, reports the Reuters news agency, citing unidentified official sources. The credit would be issued by the Brazilian Development Bank, BNDS.

The strongman of the Cuban economy, Marino Murillo, began Thursday a working visit to Brazil. Currently, Brazil is financing projects in Cuba in sectors such as food, agriculture and infrastructure, among which are the promotion of genetically modified crops in the center of the island, and the mega-port of Mariel Bay.

The Cuban government will implement new taxes in 2014, the Minister of Finance and Prices, Lina Pedraza Rodriguez, told the Council of Ministers on Tuesday. Pedraza also announced that as of next year State owned companies will be able to use up to 50% of their profits after taxes, for development, investment and direct stimulation to their workers.

Marino Murillo, one of Cuba’s vice presidents and considered the gatekeeper of the Communist Party’s economic “updating”, told the Council of Ministers on Tuesday that a first group of 126 non-agricultural cooperatives will be operational soon.

The Cuban government has issued a regulation for “maquiladora” companies that will operate in the future Special Development Zone at Mariel, a port west of Havana that’s being expanded into a major facility, reports AFP.

Direct flights between Miami and the eastern Cuban city of Manzanillo begin today for the first time, through the company Wilson International reported Café Fuerte. The air link between the two cities will depart every Monday at 2 pm. Another similar service to Camaguey is set to start on April 16.

The US embargo on Cuba has made possible the continued theft of the island’s famous Cohiba Cigar trademark by the US firm General Cigars.

More than 50 thousand cubic meters of timber, demolished by Hurricane Sandy last October, are about to be lost in the eastern province of Santiago de Cuba, while the resource is scarce at the sales points for building materials needed by the population, reported the Café Fuerte website.

Problems as diverse as shortage of raw material (raw cane), industrial accidents, the breakdown of machinery, lack of rigor and exigency, and the damage caused by Hurricane Sandy in eastern Cuba cast doubt on the outcome of the current sugar harvest.

Cuban President Raul Castro and First Vice President Miguel Diaz-Canel officers sent two separate messages of congratulations to newly elected Chinese leaders, reported dpa news.