Fifty one years after the Cuban Revolution the challenge of providing a sufficient amount of quality farm products for the island’s population has yet to be met. In this part two, and in a previous article, Cuba’s Produce Market Maze (1), a Havana Times contributor speaks with farmers and vendors to take a look at the current issues.
Read MoreThe Cuban government handed over small public transportation buses in the capital to be managed by the persons who drive them, in another gesture of opening to the private sector in services, until now under State control, reported the accredited press in the island. The measure follows that of the creation of cooperatives in barbershops and beauty parlors, and taxi rental.
Read MoreSpain is a “valid interlocutor” in Cuba’s dialogue with the European Union, affirmed the island’s foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez, in statements to the press in Madrid. Rodríguez also affirmed that his government “does not recognize the European Union any moral authority to deal with questions of human rights” in the Caribbean country.
Read MoreIn practice, however, the movement of produce between the field and the dinner table has become slow and complicated, engendering considerable losses due to waste, theft and misappropriations at several points along the chain, productive imbalances and irregularities in the use of transportation, including the misuse of fuel.
Read MoreAgricultural production reported strong decreases in the first quarter of this year as compared to 2009 in key food products in Cuba, according to a report by the National Office of Statistics (ONE). While the collection of tubers in general increased 4.5 per cent and rice, essential in the island’s diet, the production of beans and vegetables fell by 40.5 and 35.1 per cent, respectively. Moreover, citrus fruit decreased 21.6 per cent.
Read MoreAn earthquake of 4.1 degrees on the Richter scale was reported Friday evening in the Havana municipality of Artemisa, some 50 kilometers west of the Cuban capital, reported the Network of Stations of the National Seismological Service. The unusual earthquake was followed by aftershocks of between 2.8 and three degrees.
Read MoreIn the middle of the night off the coast of Caibarien, Cuba, Miakiel Gonzalez waded the waist-deep Caribbean water until he stood a mile from the shore. Carrying nothing more than a bag packed with two changes of clothes, some drinking water and his Cuban ID, the 31-year-old waited several hours in the sea for the smuggler boat to arrive.
Read MoreIn the beginning, I didn’t have the luck of having someone to tell me what to do. Fortunately, in 98, a friend began to support me. She’s heterosexual but we forged a friendship that continues today. She understood me, and I’ll thank her eternally for being there, because she was on my side in very difficult situations and without her I’m sure I wouldn’t have been able to continue.
Read MoreThe 10th Congress of the National Association of Small Farmers (ANAP) began Friday in the Cuban capital, reported IPS. The representatives of the cooperative and small farmer sector will debate the means to increase food production, substitute imports and increase exports.
Read MoreThe European Union (EU) Common Position toward Cuba prevents the 27 member nations “from having the possibility of establishing a serene and respectful dialogue and backing the changes that the Cubans want to make when they decide to make them,” said Juan Pablo de Laiglesia, Spanish secretary of state for Iberian America. De Laiglesia denied that Madrid’s wish to establish a new framework of relations with the island means relegating “the political and especially the human rights demands.”
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