As Cuba’s Food Continues to Rot…

The “restless” deputies concerned over the loss of crops

By Fernando Ravsberg

HAVANA TIMES — A local radio station (Radio Minas) reports that the loss of crops aroused the “concerns” of deputies at the meeting of Parliament, “because many of the products such as tomatoes and mangoes are spoiling in the fields for lack of productive capacity both in the large industries and small processing centers.”

“We are clear of the effort made in urban agriculture and in the increased production of fruit. Today, mangoes are going bad from Guantanamo to Havana, as they are not received because the processing plant lacks containers for them. We’ll end up importing the pulp, which costs much more to the country,” said Avilio Piedra in the town of Quivicán, Mayabeque.

It is paradoxical that the government continues to ask farmers to increase food production when the state doesn’t have the capacity to absorb these crops. And this is nothing new, each year the deputies discuss the same subject but in the end always ends up putting on a band-aid to fight the cancer which returns metastasized.

If the state enterprises are unable to process this production they should stand aside and allow the creation of cooperatives and small private companies. What should not happen is to preserve the “purity” of a [state-centralized] ideology while continuing to squander the sweat of the farmers and food of the people.