Food Production in Cuba Is Going Through Worst Moments
Deficiencies in all sectors, non-payments to producers, lack of fuel and an exodus of the labor force.
HAVANA TIMES If anything became clear this Monday after the analysis in the National Assembly of the performance of the Food Industry and Agriculture so far this year, it is that none of the sectors – very dependent on each other – is progressing at a good pace. No improvement is expected either, since the problems that hit them the most persist: fuel continues to be scarce; wages are insufficient to prevent workers from leaving; and producers, who are owed millions of pesos, prefer not to do business with the State.
As acknowledged by Alexis Rodríguez Pérez, Director General of Economy and Agricultural Development of the Ministry of Agriculture, of the ten fundamental categories, only four have met their targets since 2023 and so far this year: produce, vegetables, corn and rice; whereas, meat, milk and egg productions are in a critical state.
The official warned that “the indices of beef and horse meat production have been affected by the poor organizational work between the companies and the slaughterhouses for the hiring of producers, the insufficiency in the transport of animals to the slaughterhouse due to lack of fuel, the low weight of the animals slaughtered due to the deficit in animal feed and the drought in some territories.”
Of a plan for 20,400 tons of beef for the first half of 2024, only 15,200 were achieved. For pork, only 3,800 tons were reached in the same period, out of the 11,300 projected. The figures are alarming when compared to those of 2022, when, for beef alone, 172,300 tons were produced in the year.
Eggs remained at 94,070,000 units, below the 231,900,000 units agreed. “Other products also reflected the downward trend with respect to the plan: beans, tobacco, milk, coffee, cocoa and honey,” adds Cubadebate without mentioning figures.
With such numbers, it is not surprising that 74 companies in the sector have closed the semester with losses of 1,199,946,100 pesos, with the worst situation being Avicola (poultry), Tabacuba (tobacco), Agroforestal (agroforestry), Ganadera (livestock), and Labiofam (pharmaceuticals). Likewise, the non-payments to farmers, due to the huge debt of Acopio — Cuba’s State Procurement and Distribution agency — is another burden. The two most critical cases are the debts of Artemisa province, 167,694,630 pesos, and Mayabeque province, 15,166,378.
“The fundamental cause is the debt of Acopio-La Habana with the companies,” explains the official press, which says that to “solve” the problem, the Central Bank of Cuba approved a credit of 400 million pesos, in addition to a revolving credit line (which can be re-requested if paid on time) of 100 million that will allow Acopio to “pay for the current purchases from the marketing agricultural companies, among other credits approved to other companies that carry debts from the year 2022.”
The measure, however, is far from making the real problem disappear: the lack of the State budget and the failed business models that do not guarantee production. “The Government seems to have normalized that great ‘distortion’ of the Cuban economy called Acopio, which continues with its eternal mania of not paying its debts, a bad practice that today is rewarded with generous credits from the state bank,” the economist Pedro Monreal laments on his X account.
It’s not just the salaries for the producers that put the food industry at stake. In the first quarter of the year, 6,723 state workers and 7,418 cooperative members abandoned jobs related to the harvest, mostly in search of “job opportunities with higher remuneration and the demand for skilled labor by the new economic actors,” according to the authorities.
“To conclude the last harvest and fulfill the plan, extra personnel had to be sought, including 113 inmates who joined the work,” they add. The “discovery” that wages are insufficient is, at the very least, “absurd at this point in the game,” Monreal says.
The sugar campaign not only lost an important part of its workforce, but the shortage of fuel, the lack of fertilizers and the burning of cane — 750,000 tons were lost for this reason — in addition to about 16,000 hectares that remained uncollected, also weighed down production. The poor quality of the plant was also a cause for complaint among the producers.
During the first months of 2024, the laws and resolutions implemented, such as the Fisheries and Food Sovereignty Law, have not managed to improve the situation either. The greater flexibility to deliver licenses to fishermen, among other measures, have managed to increase permits by 48% compared to 2022, but fewer and fewer fishermen enter into contracts with the State — since it is no longer mandatory to obtain authorization. As a result, “the catches declared by these economic actors amounted to 1,029 tons in 2023 and 214 tons up to April of this year, but fishing companies have only bought 104 tons, 48.8% of the declared catch,” the authorities calculate.
“The catches and industrial production [targets] are also not complied with, reaching only 68% of what was planned,” which has its main cause in the shortage of fishermen, “the lack of better living and working conditions for them” and neglect of the reservoirs.
The Island’s assessment is exactly what the deputies warned about from the beginning of the sessions about the Agriculture and Food Industry: in the Cuban economy there is a “tendency to non-compliance” and very few clear solutions.
Translated by Regina Anavy for Translating Cuba.
The Cubans are too dependent on the canadians tourists for their generosity. They are just spoiled, looking for an easy was out.
3 years ago all sectors of the population were better off with the CUC and excepting the American dollars, the euro, and Canadian dollars. It worked very well also allow tourist to bring in canned food stuffs, without any duties at the incoming airports that is what i may suggest as a Canadian tourist going there for the last 30 years life for the population & the government will change the pesos is the biggest problem.
“In the first quarter of the year, 6,723 state workers and 7,418 cooperative members abandoned jobs related to the harvest, mostly in search of “job opportunities with higher remuneration and the demand for skilled labor by the new economic actors,” according to the authorities.” How is any economy supposed to operate productively when there is a shortage of essential labour? The economy flounders.
In Western economies where there is a shortage of labour, particularly in the agricultural sector where the work is laborious and the remuneration low, workers are imported from other countries. In, Cuba this is not a solution. As the quoted paragraph clearly states Cuban workers are not going to sacrifice their labour for menial wages when higher wages are possible in the economy.
Historically, the Cuban government relied on propaganda slogans to spur the production of sugar cane, and other agricultural products. That is no longer the case. Cuban workers want to get paid a living wage for their labour like all other workers in the world. The Cuban government cannot meet this very basic need for its workers. Hence, the stagnant agricultural sector.
Moreover, Cubans have been allowed to operate small businesses and these enterprises provide the entrepreneurs the satisfaction of working, absolutely for minimal remuneration, but at least for themselves. Those agricultural workers who must stay in the sector will put forth exactly what the state pays them, if the state has the funds to pay, a very minimal effort. Hence, the Cuban economy is suffering the production crisis currently being witnessed.
The current exodus of thousands of Cubans from the island probably has little impact on the agricultural sector since most young people, not only in Cuba but worldwide, do not work in the agricultural sector nor have any desire to have a career in this specific sector. Probably the paramount problem is that those Cubans already working in the agricultural sector are not being paid, plus, extremely paramount, is “ . . . producers, who are owed millions of pesos, prefer not to do business with the State.”
When your only source of productive labour abandons the farm – the State – the house of cards falls dramatically. What does one expect?
In any country surrounded by seas and oceans, the fishing industry is a lucrative economic contributing sector.. Why not in Cuba an island surrounded by fish? One would think Cuban fishermen would be economically well off. According to the article: “ . . . fewer and fewer fishermen enter into contracts with the State — since it is no longer mandatory to obtain authorization.”
Again, like the other Cuban economic sectors, independent fishermen, and there are few of them, prefer to not deal with the State. The State, as the article articulates clearly, “ . . . continues with its eternal mania of not paying its debts. “ Workers whether they be egg producers, beef farmers, sugar cane producers, or fishermen must be paid in a timely fashion, and if the State cannot fulfill that basic monetary task, the failed consequences are what one gets.
At the end of the day, it is not the State government workers who bear the burden of the economic malaise but the majority of Cuban citizens who must pay inflated prices for basic food because of an excessive demand and a constant low supply.