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I. the Food Crisis in Cuba

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I. the Food Crisis in Cuba I. The Food Crisis in Cuba Mamonal, a village located in one of the ferti l e President Castro painfully listed the commit- valleys of Ciego de Avila, was once the king of ments unfulfilled by Cub a ’s former allies: tomatoes and sugar, as well as a host of other As of September 30 [1992], we had pr oducts. Farmers eschewed hoes for large trac- rec e i v ed none of the rice, 50% of the split tors, oxen for agricultural combines, and water- peas, 16% of the vegetable oil, 7% of the ing cans for micro-jet irrigation systems. la r d, 11% of the condensed milk, 47% of Mamonal tomatoes wer e shipped from one end the butter, 18% of the canned meat, 22% of the island to the other. The Mamonal can- of the powde r ed milk, 11% of the fres h ne r y produced tomato purée in 55-gallon and canned fish, 16% of the ferti l i ze r s , dr ums, as anything smaller may have seemed none of the sulphur . not worth the effort. Ten years ago an economic crisis brought this all to a dramatic halt. Despite Cub a ’s lying half a world away, its “Why bother planting?” rem a r ked Rey n a l d o economy had been nearly completely dependent Gar cía, a 65-year-old farmer from Mam o n a l . on the Soviet bloc. In 1987, for example, 88% “We didn’t have seeds. We didn’t have ferti l i ze r . We didn’t have fuel for tractors or electricity for the water pumps. Nothing would grow.” The tomato yield in 1994 was negligible— only 5% of its peak five years earlier. Wit h o u t tomatoes, thousands of seasonal workers lost their employment and the cannery opened only ten days that yea r . And it was not just the toma- to industry, but all industries from sugar to pharmaceuticals, that collapsed in the economic crisis. Without food in the fields, people in the cities went hungry. The breakup of socialism first in eastern Eur ope in 1989 and then in the Soviet Union in 1990 created a major crisis in Cuba known as the “special period.” Cuba lost 80% of its export of Cub a ’s trade took place with eastern Euro p e Until the economi ma r ket and its imports fell by 80%—from $8 and the USSR. Gen e r ous trade agreements had crisis, Cuban farms billion to $1.7 billion—practically overnight. al l o wed Cuba to trade sugar for oil—generating used prop o rt i o n a l l y as many tractors a The country went into shock as employ- an enormous capital surplus which in turn U.S. farms. Her e ment, production, and standards of living wen t permitted Cuba to make a sustained inves t m e n t sugar cane com- into a tailspin. In the cities, buses stopped run - in industry, agriculture, health, and education.4 bines move from ning, generators stopped producing electricity, Thus for decades Cubans had the brea t h i n g one cane field to an o t h e r . [Rod e r i c k factories became as silent as gravey a r ds. Obt a i n - space to circu m v ent the worst effects of the U.S. Sin c l a i r ] ing enough food for the day became the pri- embargo against Cuba. After 1989 every t h i n g ma r y activity for many, if not most, Cubans. At changed; without the aid of the Soviet Uni o n , the Cuban Communist Part y ’s fourth Congres s , Cubans wer e left at sea. Cuban Agriculture, Sovi e t-s ty l e Cuban agriculture was particularly vulnerable. In the 1960s and 1970s the rev olution had reshaped agriculture under the principles that the state is the central force and that mechaniza- tion would raise the dignity of human labor. Th re e - q u a r ters of the arable land was held by large state farms, which predominantly pro- duced a single crop: sugar. Agriculture depended heavily on chemical inputs. In fact Cuban farms used more ferti l i z er than U.S. farms (see chart be l o w). Bef o r e the economic crisis Cuba import- ed 1.3 million tons of chemical ferti l i z ers (Mur - ph y , 1999); today the figure is not more than Soviet and U.S. models in that it was large- During the crisis 160,000 tons (Gut i é r r ez intervi e w, May 2001).5 scale, oriented towards export, subsidized, the Cuban diet Bef o r e the crisis, Cuba used 17,000 tons of her- heavily mechanized, and dependent on chemi- has lacked pro- teins. Only those bicides, and 10,000 tons of pesticides (Mur p h y , cal inputs. This made the Cuban model who could afford 1999); today Cuba uses 1,900 tons (Gut i é r r ez extremely vulnerable to dramatic changes in high prices could in t e rv i e w, May 2001). Farms wer e also heavily the trade and aid environment. buy chickens, such me c h a n i z ed at a level comparable to the Uni t e d Although the infrastructure for capital- as these sold in an open market in States. One cooperative president told the intensive agriculture still existed, in 1990 the Santiago de Cuba. authors, “We had more tractors than we could Cuban agricultural model began to collapse as use.” He added, “When the ministry told us to one problem after another halted production. go to the port to pick up a new tractor, we said Imported inputs vanished—no chemical fer- that we wer e too busy. We never went.” tilizers, animal feed, tools, seeds, wire, or ani- Many have compared the Cuban model to mal vaccines. Fuel for tractors and irrigation the Soviet model of collective farms. Although systems was practically unobtainable, as were there were similarities, unlike the Soviet ti r es or batteries or spare parts. Cub a n - p ro d u c e d Union, Cuba never forced collectivization and goods such as feed, pipes, tools, fertilizers, and retained a high percentage of private farmers. pesticides dried up because of the same litany Cuban agriculture was similar to both the of problems: no raw materials, no electricity High Input Agriculture Fert i l i z e r s 1989 Me c h a n i z a tion 1989 Ir r i g a tion 1989 (k g / h e c ta re ) (t ra c to rs / 1 00 hectar es) (i r r i g at i o n / c u l t i v ated area ) 200 3 20% 15% 2 100 10% 1 5% 0 0 0% ■ Cu b a ■ LA / C a r r i b b e a n ■ U. S . ■ Cu b a ■ LA / C a r r i b b e a n ■ U. S . ■ Cu b a ■ LA / C a r r i b b e a n ■ U. S . (S O U R CE: Pér ez, p.77, based on 1995 FAO data) Cub a ’s case has been strikingly different. Fir s t of all, the government held, despite the dire pre- dictions. Th r oughout the worst years, 1993 to 1995, two basic government policies kept the food crisis from emergency levels: food pro- grams for the vulnerable population (the elderly, ch i l d r en, and pregnant and lactating mothers) and the state food distribution system throu g h the ration card (although drastically red u c e d co m p a r ed to levels in the 1980s). Social unres t has been minimal even though the differen c e s ha v e increased between the have’s and the have- no t ’s in a society where those differences had ta t e - o p e ra t e d to run the factories, no functioning trucks, been successfully reduced. Government policies st o r es, known as and no petroleum. and farmers’ practices have rev amped prod u c - odegas, became The rural economy in Cuba slowed and then tion and distribution systems and regained a epleted as the mount of food practically stopped. Tractors stood useless in the basis of food security. This type of widesprea d isbursed throu g h fields, electric pumps went dry as crops wilted in change would be rem a r kable in normal times, he ration system the fields, and animals died or wer e slaughtered dr opped by half. for food as their feed disappeared. Acc o r ding to [St e v e Cag a n ] The impact on food security was disast r ous. Daily the Economists Intelligence Uni t ’s evaluation, the agricultural sector began to contract by 10.3% in pe r- c a p i t a caloric intak e fell from 2,908 in 1989 to 1992, then by 22.7% in 1993 and by 4.9% in 1, 8 63 calories in 1995, according to the USDA, 1994. By 1994, agricultural production had plummeted to 55% of its 1990 level. Prod u c t i o n and prot ein intak e dropped by 40%. Some est i m a te d decline was only half the story.
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