Cuban Medical Aid to Haiti

One of the World’s Best Kept Secrets:Cuban Medical Aid to Haiti

By EMILY J. KIRK and JOHN M. KIRK

Media coverage of Cuban medical cooperation following the disastrous recent earthquake in Haiti was sparse indeed. International news reports usually described the Dominican Republic as being the first to provide assistance, while Fox News sang the praises of U.S. relief efforts in a report entitled "U.S. Spearheads Global Response to Haiti Earthquake"-a common theme of its extensive coverage. CNN also broadcast hundreds of reports, and in fact one focused on a Cuban doctor wearing a T-shirt with a large image of Che Guevara–and yet described him as a "Spanish doctor".

In general, international news reports ignored Cuba’s efforts. By March 24, CNN for example, had 601 reports on their news website regarding the earthquake in Haiti-of which only 18 (briefly) referenced Cuban assistance. Similarly, between them the New York Times and the Washington Post had 750 posts regarding the earthquake and relief efforts, though not a single one discusses in any detail any Cuban support. In reality, however, Cuba’s medical role had been extremely important-and had been present since 1998.

Cuba and Haiti Pre-Earthquake

In 1998, Haiti was struck by Hurricane Georges. The hurricane caused 230 deaths, destroyed 80% of the crops, and left 167,000 people homeless.[1] Despite the fact that Cuba and Haiti had not had diplomatic relations in over 36 years, Cuba immediately offered a multifaceted agreement to assist them, of which the most important was medical cooperation.

Cuba adopted a two-pronged public health approach to help Haiti. First, it agreed to maintain hundreds of doctors in the country for as long as necessary, working wherever they were posted by the Haitian government. This was particularly significant as Haiti’s health care system was easily the worst in the Americas, with life expectancy of only 54 years in 1990 and one out of every 5 adult deaths due to AIDS, while 12.1% of children died from preventable intestinal infectious diseases.[2]

In addition Cuba agreed to train Haitian doctors in Cuba, providing that they would later return and take the places of the Cuban doctors (a process of "brain gain" rather than "brain drain"). Significantly, the students were selected from non-traditional backgrounds, and were mainly poor. It was thought that, because of their socio-economic background, they fully understood their country’s need for medical personnel, and would return to work where they were needed. The first cohort of students began studying in May, 1999 at the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM).

By 2007, significant change had already been achieved throughout the country. It is worth noting that Cuban medical personnel were estimated to be caring for 75% of the population.[3] Studies by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) indicated clear improvements in the health profile since this extensive Cuban medical cooperation began.

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Improvements in Public Health in Haiti, 1999-2007[4]

Health Indicator 1999 2007

Infant Mortality, per 1,000 live births 80 33
Child Mortality Under 5 per 1,000 135 59.4
Maternal Mortality per 100,000 live births 523 285
Life Expectancy (years) 54 61

Cuban medical personnel had clearly made a major difference to the national health profile since 1998, largely because of their proactive role in preventive medicine-as can be seen below.

Selected Statistics on Cuban Medical Cooperation
Dec. 1998-May 2007[5]

Visits to the doctor 10,682,124
Doctor visits to patients 4,150,631
Attended births 86,633
Major and minor surgeries 160,283
Vaccinations 899,829
Lives saved (emergency) 210,852

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By 2010, at no cost to medical students, Cuba had trained some 550 Haitian doctors, and is at present training a further 567. Moreover, since 1998 some 6,094 Cuban medical personnel have worked in Haiti. They had given over 14.6 million consultations, carried out 207,000 surgical operations, including 45,000 vision restoration operations through their Operation Miracle programme, attended 103,000 births, and taught literacy to 165,000. In fact at the time of the earthquake there were 344 Cuban medical personnel there. All of this medical cooperation, it must be remembered, was provided over an 11-year period before the earthquake of January 12, 2010.[6]

Cuba and Haiti Post-Earthquake

The earthquake killed at least 220,000, injured 300,000 and left 1.5 million homeless.[7] Haitian PrimeMinister Jean-Max Bellerive described it as "the worst catastrophe that has occurred in Haiti in two centuries".[8]

International aid began flooding in. It is important to note the type of medical aid provided by some major international players. Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), for example, an organization known for its international medical assistance, flew in some 348 international staff, in addition to the 3,060 national staff it already employed. By March 12 they had treated some 54,000 patients, and completed 3,700 surgical operations.[9]

Canada’s contribution included the deployment of 2,046 Canadian Forces personnel, including 200 DART personnel. The DART (Disaster Assistance Response Team) received the most media attention, as it conducted 21,000 consultations-though it should be noted they do not treat any serious trauma patients or provide surgical care. Indeed, among the DART personnel, only 45 are medical staff, with others being involved in water purification, security, and reconstruction. In total, the Canadians stayed for only 7 weeks.[10]

The United States government, which received extensive positive media attention, sent the USNS "Comfort", a 1,000-bed hospital ship with a 550-person medical staff and stayed for 7 weeks, in which time they treated 871 patients, performing 843 surgical operations.[11] Both the Canadian and US contributions were important-while they were there.

Lost in the media shuffle was the fact that, for the first 72 hours following the earthquake, Cuban doctors were in fact the main medical support for the country. Within the first 24 hours, they had completed 1,000 emergency surgeries, turned their living quarters into clinics, and were running the only medical centers in the country, including 5 comprehensive diagnostic centers (small hospitals) which they had previously built. In addition another 5 in various stages of construction were also used, and they turned their ophthalmology center into a field hospital-which treated 605 patients within the first 12 hours following the earthquake.[12]

Cuba soon became responsible for some 1,500 medical personnel in Haiti. Of those, some 344 doctors were already working in Haiti, while over 350 members of the "Henry Reeve" Emergency Response Medical Brigade were sent by Cuba following the earthquake. In addition, 546 graduates of ELAM from a variety of countries, and 184 5th and 6th year Haitian ELAM students joined, as did a number of Venezuelan medical personnel. In the final analysis, they were working throughout Haiti in 20 rehabilitation centers and 20 hospitals, running 15 operating theatres, and had vaccinated 400,000. With reason Fidel Castro stated, "we send doctors, not soldiers".[13]

A glance at the medical role of the various key players is instructive.

Comparative Medical Contributions in Haiti by March 23[14]

MSF Canada United States Cuba
No. of Staff
3,408 45 550 1,504

No. of Patients Treated
54,000 21,000 871 227,143

No. of Surgeries
3,700 0 843 6,499

These comparative data, compiled from several sources, are particularly telling as they indicate the significant (and widely ignored) medical contribution of the Cubans. In fact, they have treated 4.2 times the number of patients compared with MSF (which has over twice as many workers, as well as significantly more financial resources), and 10.8 times more than the Canadian DART team. (As noted, Canadian and US medical personnel had left by March 9). Also notable is the fact that the Cuban medical contingent was roughly three times the size of the American staff, although they treated 260.7 times more patients than U.S. medical personnel. Clearly, there have been significant differences in the nature of medical assistance provided.

It is also important to note that approximately one-half of the Cuban medical staff was working outside the capital, Port-au-Prince, where there was significant damage as well. Many medical missions could not get there, however, due to transportation issues. Significantly, the Cuban medical brigade also worked to minimize epidemics by making up 30 teams to educate communities on how to properly dispose of waste, as well as how to minimize public health risks. Noted Cuban artist Kcho also headed a cultural brigade made up of clowns, magicians and dancers, supported by psychologists and psychiatrists, to deal with the trauma experienced by Haitian children.

Perhaps most impressively, following the growing concern for the health of the country, due to a poor and now largely destroyed health care system Cuba, working with ALBA (the Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América) countries, presented to the WHO an integral program to reconstruct the health care system of Haiti. Essentially, they are offering to rebuild the entire health care system. It will be supported by ALBA and Brazil, and run by Cubans and Cuban-trained medical staff. This is to include hospitals, polyclinics, and medical schools. In addition, the Cuban government has offered to increase the number of Haitian students attending medical school in Cuba. This offer of medical cooperation represents an enormous degree of support for Haiti.[15] Sadly, this generous offer has not been reported by international media.

While North American media might have ignored Cuba’s role, Haiti has not. A pointed remark was made by Haitian President Mr. René Préval, who noted, "you did not wait for an earthquake to help us".[16] Similarly, Haiti’s Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive has also repeatedly noted that the first three countries to help were Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Venezuela.

Sadly (but not surprisingly), while Cuba’s efforts to assist Haiti have increased, international efforts have continued to dwindle. The head of the Cuban medical mission, Dr. Carlos Alberto García, summed up well the situation just two weeks after the tragedy: "many foreign delegations have already begun to leave, and the aid which is arriving now is not the same it used to be. Sadly, as always happens, soon another tragedy will appear in another country, and the people of Haiti will be forgotten, left to their own fate". Significantly, he added "However we will still be here long after they have all gone."[17] This in fact has been the case. Canadian forces, for example, returned home and the USNS Comfort sailed several weeks ago. By contrast, Cuban President Raúl Castro noted: "we have accompanied the Haitian people, and we will continue with them whatever time is needed, no matter how many years, with our very modest support".[18]

A representative of the World Council of Churches to the United Nations made the telling comment that "humanitarian aid could not be human if it was only publicized for 15 days".[19] Today Cuba, with the support of ALBA and Brazil, is working not to build a field hospital, but rather a health care system. And, while international efforts have been largely abandoned, the Cuban staff and Cuban-trained medical staff will remain, as they have done for the past 11 years, for as long as necessary. This is a story that international media have chosen not to tell-now that the television cameras have gone. Yet it is an extraordinary story of true humanitarianism, and of great success in saving lives since 1998. Moreover, in light of Cuba’s success in providing public health care (at no cost to the patients) to millions of Haitians, this approach to preventive, culturally sensitive, low cost and effective medicine needs to be told. That significant contribution to this impoverished nation, and Cuba’s ongoing commitment to its people, clearly deserve to be recognized. Until then it will sadly remain as one of the world’s best- kept secrets.


Emily J. Kirk will be an M.A. student in Latin American Studies at CambridgeUniversity in September.

John Kirk is a professor of Latin American Studies at Dalhousie University, Canada. Both are working on a project on Cuban medical internationalism sponsored by Canada’s Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). Professor Kirk co-wrote with Michael Erisman the 2009 book "Cuba’s Medical Internationalism: Origins, Evolution and Goals" (Palgrave Macmillan). He spent most of February and March in El Salvador and Guatemala, accompanying the Henry Reeve Brigade in El Salvador, and working with the Brigada Medica Cubana in Guatemala.

Notes

[1] "Audit of USAID/HAITI Hurricane Georges Recovery Programme". USAID. 15 May, 2001. Retrieved 10 March, 2010 from

[2] See entry for "Haiti" on the Pan American Health Organization website, found at http://www.paho.org/english/dd.ais/cp_332.htm. Accessed February 2, 2010.

[3] William Steif, "Cuban Doctors Aid Strife-Torn Haiti." The State. April 26, 2004, and found athttp://havanajournal.com/culture/entry/cuban_doctors_aid_strife_torn_haiti/Accessed June 21, 2007.

[4] See entry for "Haiti" on the Pan American Health Organization website, found at http://www.paho.org/english/dd/ais/cp_332.htm. Accessed February 2 2010.

[5] Anna Kovac, "Cuba Trains Hundred of Haitian Doctors to Make a Difference," August 6, 2007. Located on the MEDICC website athttp:www.medicc.org/cubahealthreports/chr-article.php?&a=1035. Accessed February 2, 2010.

[6] Ibid., "Haitian Medical Students in Cuba". Medical Education Cooperation With Cuba. 12 January, 2010. Retrieved 12 January, 2010 from , "La colabaración cubana permanecerá en Haití los años que sean necesarios", Cubadebate. 24 February, 2010. Retrieved 9 March, 2010 from , "Fact Sheet: Cuban Medical Cooperation With Haiti". Medicc Review. 15 January, 2009. Retrieved 2 February, 2010 fromhttp://www.medicc.org/ns/index.php?s=104.

[7] "Haiti Earthquake: Special Coverage". CNN. 20 March, 2010. Retrieved 22 March, 2010 from

[8] Tyler Maltbie, "Haiti Earthquake: The Nations That Are Stepping Up To Help", The Christian Science Monitor, Posted January 14, 2010 onhttp://www.csmonitor.com/layout/set/print/content/view/print273879. Accessed January 28, 2010.

[9] "Two Months After the Quake, New Services and New Concerns". MSF. 12 March, 2010. Retrieved 17 March, 2010 from

[10] "Canada’s Response to the Earthquake in Haiti: Progress to Date". Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada. March 17, 2010. Retrieved 17 March, 2010 from

[11] "USNS Comfort Completes HaitiMission, March 9, 2010". American Forces Press Service. 9 March, 2010. Retrieved 11 March, 2010 from

[12] John Burnett, "Cuban Doctors Unsung Heroes of Haitian Earthquake", National Public Radio report, January 24, 2010, and found athttp://www.npr.org/templates/story.ph?storyID=122919202. Accessed 28 January, 2010.

[13] José Steinsleger. "Haiti, Cuba y la ley primera," La Jornada, February 3, 2010., Data in this section came from the address given by Ambassador Rodolfo Reyes Rodríguez on January, 27, 2010 inGeneva at the 13th Special Session of the U.N. Human Rights Council on Haiti. It can be accessed at "Cuba en Ginebra: ‘Ante tan difícil situación humanitaria en Haití no puede haber titubeos ni indiferencia," on the Cubbadebate website:

[14] Connor Gorry. "Two of the 170,000 + Cases". Medicc Review. March 8, 2010. Retrieved 10 March, 2010 from , "Cooperación con Haití debe ser a largo plazo." Juventud Rebelde. 23 March, 2010. Retrieved March 23, 2010 from , "Haiti: Two Months After The Quake, New Services and New Concerns". MSF. 12 March, 2010. Retrieved 17 March, 2010 from http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news/article_print.cfm?id=4320>, "Haiti-USNS Comfort Medical And Surgical Support". U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. 11 March, 2010. Retrieved 11 March, 2010 from , Brett Popplewell. "This HaitianTown Is Singing Canada’s Praise". The Star. 26 January, 2010. Retrieved 17 March from , "USNS Comfort Leaves Haiti". 13 News. 11 March, 2010. Retrieved 11 March, 2010 from

[15] In a March 27, 2010 meeting in Port-au-Prince between President Préval and the Cuban and Brazilian ministers of health (José Ramón Balaguer and José Gomes), details were provided about what Balaguer termed "a plot of solidarity to assist the Haitian people". Gomes added "We have just signed an agreement-Cuba, Brazil and Haiti-according to which all three countries make a commitment to unite our forces in order to reconstruct the health system in Haiti. An extraordinary amount of work is currently being carried out in terms of meeting the most basic and most pressing needs, but now it is necessary to think about the future [.] Haiti needs a permanent, quality healthcare system, supported by well-trained professionals [.] We will provide this, together with Cuba-a country with an extremely long internationalist experience, a great degree of technical ability, great determination, and an enormous amount of heart. Brazil and Cuba, two nations that are so close, so similar, now face a new challenge: together we will unite our efforts to rebuild Haiti, and rebuild the public health system of this country". See "Cuba y Brasil suman esfuerzos con Haití," Juventud Rebelde, March 28, 2010 (Translation to English provided by authors).

[16] "Presidente Preval agradece a Fidel y Raúl Castro ayuda solidaria a Haití". 8 February, 2010. Retrieved 9 February, 2010 from

[17] María Laura Carpineta, "Habla el jefe de los 344 médicos cubanos instalados en Haití desde hace doce años". Página 12 [Argentina]. February 4, 2010, found at CUBA-L [18] Ibid. [19] "Press Conference on Haiti Humanitarian Aid," held at the United Nations on March 23, 2004 and found at htto://www.un.org/News/briefings/docs/2004/CanadaPressCfc.doc.htm. Accessed November 21, 2008.

This commentary was written for Cuba-L Analysis and CounterPunch.

Corruption: The true counter-revolution?

By Esteban Morales

From the UNEAC website

When we closely observe Cuba's internal situation today, we can have no doubt that the counter-revolution, little by little, is taking positions at certain levels of the State and Government.

Without a doubt, it is becoming evident that there are people in positions of government and state who are girding themselves financially for when the Revolution falls, and others may have everything almost ready to transfer state-owned assets to private hands, as happened in the old USSR.

Fidel said that we ourselves could put an end to the Revolution and I tend to think that, among other concerns, the Commander in Chief was referring to the questions relative to corruption. Because this phenomenon, already present, has continued to appear in force. If not, see what has happened with the distribution of lands in usufruct in some municipalities around the country: fraud, illegalities, favoritism, bureaucratic slowness, etc.

In reality, corruption is a lot more dangerous than the so-called domestic dissidence. The latter is still isolated; it lacks an alternative program, has no real leaders, no masses. But corruption turns out to be the true counter-revolution, which can do the most damage because it is within the government and the state apparatus, which really manage the country's resources.

Otherwise, let us look at something very simple. When is there powdered milk in the black market (which has been rising in price to 70 pesos per kilogram)? When the powdered milk reaches the state-owned warehouses. There's no better example than that. And so it is with the products acquired in the black market by part of a majority of the population. In other words, at the expense of the state's resources, there is an illegal market from which everyone benefits, except the State.

And what can you tell me about the street vendors, outside the large hard-currency stores, offering to sell everything. It is a corruption in which almost everyone participates, generated by the corruption of state functionaries. Because, as far as we know, in Cuba there is only one importer – the State. I don't think that what comes in the packages from Miami can generate a market that big, much less a market of lasting products.

Observe, too, the movement of pork meat from state-run stores to private outlets, the prices of beverages and water sold at the various tourism chains. The suspicious differences in prices that we stumble on so frequently.

In other words, it is evident that there is an illegal flow of products between the state's wholesale trade and the street commerce. An entire underground economy that the State is unable to control and will be impossible to set aright as long as the big imbalances between supply and demand that today characterizes our economy exists.

This economy is, then, a form of counter-revolution that does have concealed leaders, offers alternatives to the State's offerings, and has masses that practice it.

But the situation sketched above is not the most dangerous part of the affair we are now dealing with. That's only its popular surrounding.

What was recently learned regarding the weaknesses of a group of functionaries at a very high level – having to do with favoritism, the buddy system, certain acts of corruption and carelessness in the handling of sensitive information, as well as some evidence of a struggle for power waged by those functionaries – was information that, lamentably, was passing into the hands of the Spanish intelligence services, even though those services were very careful not to enlist the officials' participation. Those are extremely serious matters.

In other words, matters as sensitive as the hunger and hope for power, favoritism, corruption and unseemly statements about the country's top leadership, which were already known by the foreign special services. A real “political merchandise” with extremely high added value in the hands of the enemies of the Revolution.

When the Cuban government turned over to the FBI all the information it had about the activities of the counter-revolution in the United States, activities that included even the possibility of assassination attempts against the U.S. president, what did the FBI do? Instead of taking steps against the counter-revolution, instead of acting against the Cuban-American Mafia, they sought to find out, like hound dogs, where the information that Cuba had given them came from, what were the sources. And there we have our five devoted, heroic compatriots who have spent more than 11 years serving unjust sentences in U.S. prisons.

After the statements made by Fidel about how we ourselves can destroy the Revolution, about the existence of reasons to think that our Revolution may be reversible, what the U.S. special services must be doing is looking for information that corroborates Fidel's concerns.

They're looking for confirmation for the words of the Commander in Chief, watching closely what happens every day in Cuba, digging into everything that may allow them to find out where is the real counter-revolutionary force in Cuba, a force that can topple the Revolution, a force that appears to be not below but above, in the very levels of government and the state apparatus.

It is formed by the corrupt officials, not at all minor, who are being discovered in very high posts and with strong connections – personal, domestic and external – generated after dozens of years occupying the same positions of power. Note than none of the men “defenestrated” until now (at least since Trials 1 and 2) was a simple employee.

Very recently, General Acevedo, director of the IACC (Institute of Civil Aeronautics of Cuba) was removed, and what is making the rounds in unofficial circles about the reasons for his ouster is enough to keep people awake at nights.

There must be some truth in what they say, because this is a very small and familial country. The affair still has not had an exhaustive public explanation, as the people expect, because – if it's like the rumors say – the people's money and resources were squandered amid an economic situation that's quite critical to the country. So, either to vindicate Acevedo or to condemn him, you have to explain it to the people, the people the Revolution has created and formed, technically and scientifically, and who are prepared and with sufficient ability.

In reality, I must say, as a hypothesis, that what happened in the IACC is not unique. It has been discovered in other places and there may still be companies where the same is happening, i.e., where the chiefs are receiving commissions and opening bank accounts in other countries. Which is a working theory valid enough to open other investigations so that such affairs will not catch us by surprise. In economics, there is a “surprise audit” that is not meant to offend anyone and should not annoy anyone. To audit is not to offend; it is a mechanism of precaution that contributes to honesty.

An element we mustn’t fail to consider is that the focus of the United States' policy toward Cuba changed long ago (1986-1994). Today, basic attention is paid to Cuba's domestic reality. It is not an absolute orientation but it is fundamental and prioritized. Everything that's happening domestically in Cuba is being observed, monitored by the American politicians and particularly by the U.S. special services.

For obvious reasons that need not be explained, the Americans know better than us what Cubans and how many Cubans have bank accounts abroad. Who receive commissions and what business they're in. Because all the companies with which Cuba does business have intelligence apparatuses and almost all of them coordinate with the U.S. services. And if they don't, there are officials who, as soon as they get hold of sensitive information about Cuba, link up with the American services, which, by the way, pay handsomely for that information.

What's most lamentable is that the American services are better informed than we are about all the possible movements of our businessmen. And that's information that, if left to run, in other words, accumulate, is an excellent conduit for bribery, blackmail and the recruiting of any Cuban official. This doesn't mean it always works; there may be someone who becomes corrupt but doesn't allow himself to be recruited, because it is a very subtle matter. But whoever turns to corruption to enrich himself will find it difficult to retain other values.

Any Cuban functionary who, in his relations with any foreign enterprise, becomes corrupt, should know that that information could fall into the hands of the special services of any country, and from there to the hands of the American services it's but an instant. A dossier is immediately opened, and it is filled with information until it is considered necessary or pertinent to subject that functionary to bribery, blackmail or recruitment.

This is not being paranoid. Only fools fail to realize that any sensitive information about Cuba, its activities abroad or regarding any Cuban functionary, that is considered to be useful is very well paid by the special services of the United States. And if we don't know this by now, we're finished.

It is, then, a covert area of the subversion against Cuba that, particularly in the medium and long run, produces very good political dividends. It is an area of the counter-revolution that has nothing to do with the so-called dissidence, the piddling groups or the ill-called “ladies in white.”

Observe how the weaknesses of some Cuban functionaries were being transferred to the Spanish intelligence services. Cubans in the FAR and the MININT involved in drug trafficking. Discovered by Cuba in 1989, but that was already privileged information in the hands of the DEA, the FBI and the rest of the American special services.

Actions of that type seriously affect the ability of the country to press forward. It is as clear as a mathematical algorithm that the ability of any nation to deal with international confrontation is measured, in the first place, by its internal fortitude.

If at least Cuba could discover its corrupt officials early, the damage could be slighter.

Esteban Morales, a Cuban academician, is honorary director of the U.S. Studies Center at the University of Havana.

Cuban Environmentalist Wins Award

Cuban scientist wins U.S.-based environmental prize
Mon Apr 19, 2010 8:02am BST

By Jeff Franks

HAVANA (Reuters) - A singing scientist who says the key to Cuba's agricultural future lies in its agrarian past has become the first Cuban to win a U.S.-based Goldman Environmental Prize, the world's biggest award for grassroots environmentalism.

Humberto Rios, 46, was announced as a prize winner on Monday in San Francisco along with five other activists from around the world. They will each receive $150,000, a huge sum in Cuba where the average annual salary is equivalent to $240.

Rios said the award initially was met with suspicion by his government because it came from the United States, Cuba's longtime ideological foe. But Cuban officials eventually embraced it and he hopes it contributes to improving U.S.-Cuba relations.

"I think there's a new vision, which is to cool a little bit the hostile environment," he said. "I think we have common problems -- maybe different solutions, but also common solutions," he told Reuters recently.

He will use his prize money for such things as house repairs, but some will go toward funding his work, Rios said.

The prize was begun in 1990 by philanthropists Richard and Rhoda Goldman to encourage environmental protection.

Rios won for his work promoting a return to more traditional farming techniques focusing on seed diversity, crop rotation and the use of organic pest control and fertilizers to both increase crops and improve the communist-led island's environment.

Rios is also a musician and has found music to be a useful tool in spreading his message. At local events, he sings folk and salsa songs that promote biodiversity and good environmental practices -- "Recycle, papi, recycle" is one -- and get the farmers dancing in the fields.

Traditional farming methods fell out of favor in Cuba as agriculture, dominated by sugar production, became industrialized in the last half of the 20th century, particularly after the Soviet Union took the island under its wing following Cuba's 1959 revolution.

Flooded with pesticides and fertilizers from the Soviet bloc nations, Cuba in the 1980s became the highest-per-capita user of agrochemicals in Latin America.

At the same time, farmers, dependent on the government for seeds and supplies, had little choice in what they could grow.

POST-SOVIET CUBA

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Cuba was stuck with an agricultural system dependent on agrochemicals it could no longer get and an environment damaged by their heavy use.

Rios, then a doctoral student in agricultural sciences, began to see positive results as farmers, out of necessity, turned to traditional ways. In the late 1990s he launched a program to encourage their broader use.

His biggest emphasis, he told Reuters in a recent interview, was to simply give farmers more seed choices and to let them, not distant bureaucrats and scientists, decide which ones to use.

He began organizing "seed fairs" in farming communities where farmers could choose from a broad selection of seeds. They were encouraged to share information on the results so that each farm became a micro-experimental station.

The key was that farmers chose seeds suited to their specific conditions, he said, instead of everyone getting the same ones.

In different regions of the island, "the criteria for seed selection are completely different," Rios said.

He said yields began doubling and tripling, and soil damaged by years of overuse and chemicals began to recuperate as crops were rotated and agrochemicals abandoned.

"When you use a diversified system, over the years it increases the amount of protein per area, the amount of vitamins per area, it diminishes the amount of work per area and above all, it increases the smiles of the people," he said.

He says 50,000 farmers are involved in his Program for Local Agricultural Innovation, which is backed by the National Institute of Agricultural Sciences, but much work remains.

Most land and agriculture is under state control in Cuba, but the island has 250,000 small farmers and 1,100 private cooperatives who, together, produce 70 percent of agricultural output on less than a third of the available land.

Cuba is dependent on imports for most of its basic foods, which drains its fragile economy and has forced President Raul Castro to put more land in private hands and -- as Rios advocates -- decentralize decision-making to local levels.

(Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

Taxi Drivers and Retail Changes

* Havana taxi drivers leasing vehicles

* Beauty parlors told to prepare to become cooperatives

* Experiments viewed as harbinger of retail reform



By Marc Frank

HAVANA, March 10 (Reuters) - Cuba nationalized all retail business in 1968, down to the shoe-shine shops, but in an attempt to stimulate the stagnant economy and reduce bureaucracy, it is experimenting with giving some of it back in a form of legal private enterprise.

By leasing some retail services to state employees, the government is testing cautious change in how the communist country operates small-scale business.

"We have begun experiments and are working on others to ease the burden on the state of some services it provides," Economy Minister Marino Murillo told the National Assembly at the close of 2009, without elaborating further.

Authorities have remained mum about their efforts, but a number of experiments are under way or about to be launched in Havana, a source with knowledge of local government activities, said.

The CubaTaxi office on Palatino Street in the Cerro municipality of the capital is home to one such experiment.

Thirty of the more than 2,000 state taxi drivers in the capital are leasing their vehicles rather than working for a wage, a small percentage of the tips and whatever they can pocket on the sly.

"You pay 595 convertible pesos for the car and then after a month 39 convertible pesos plus 40 pesos a day," said Elio, one of the drivers.

"You are responsible for maintaining the taxi and gas, but can buy parts and services from the state," he said.

The government pegs the convertible peso at $1.08 or 24 pesos.

"Overall the drivers are happy. There is still control over what we charge, but we are freer and earning more," Elio, who began driving a cab in 1986, said.

"I think this system is also better for the state which is guaranteed a net income with few headaches," he added.

The project will be evaluated in June, before being applied to other dispatch offices.



CASTRO FOSTERS DEBATE

President Raul Castro has fostered debate on what to do with the retail sector since taking over from brother Fidel Castro two years ago, but has ruled out a shift back to capitalism.

The debate has spilled over into the official media with exposes over irregular supplies, low wages, employees jacking up prices and pocketing proceeds, all the while delivering poor service despite layers of bureaucracy designed to control such activities.

"The government is simply accepting what already exists, adopting new structures to legalize what was before viewed as theft and instead of spending a fortune on useless bureaucrats has begun collecting taxes," a local economist said, asking his name not be used.

In Central Havana and 10 de Octubre municipalities, beauty parlor employees were recently called to meetings and informed they would be leased their shops as cooperatives on an experimental basis.

"They said the hairdressers would be leased the premises without the administration and service employees," a participant said.

"You have to pay rent for the shop, costs such as water, electricity, materials and the wages of anyone you contract, for example a receptionist or to clean up," she said.

"You can charge whatever on the basis of supply and demand and have to pay taxes on your profits," she added.

The project was scheduled to begin this month but was postponed in part to consider objections and proposals put forward by the beauticians, she said.

State-subsidized materials arrive sporadically at the parlors and services cost anywhere from the equivalent of $0.20 (five pesos) for a shampoo to between $1 and $2 (25 pesos to 50 pesos) for hair-dyeing.

"We buy shampoo, conditioner, dye or what have you at state foreign exchange shops with a 240 percent mark up, or get our friends to bring it in from Miami or Madrid," another beautician, who also asked her name not be used, said.

"Then we tell our clients there are no state supplies, but we bought them ourselves and will have to charge accordingly," she said.

(Editing by Jeff Franks and Cynthia Osterman)

Economy Minister Calls for Reforms

* Economy minister says paternalistic state unaffordable

* Raul Castro aide slams resistance to retail sector reform

* Pilot projects readied in Havana in taxis, beauty salons



By Marc Frank

HAVANA, March 8 (Reuters) - Cuba's economy minister is pushing for less state intervention in one of the world's last Soviet-style economies, saying the government can no longer afford its all-encompassing control and paternalism, Communist Party sources say.

The drive by minister Marino Murillo appears aimed at overcoming resistance to new reforms under President Raul Castro, who has made extensive changes in agriculture since taking over in 2008 from ailing brother Fidel Castro and is thought to want change in other economic sectors.

Murillo told armed forces and interior ministry officials in January "the gigantic paternalistic state can no longer be, because there is no longer any way to maintain it," according to a Communist Party source who saw a video of the Jan. 16 event shown to party and government cadres.

Sensitive strategy and policy meetings are often not immediately made public in Communist-ruled Cuba, but videos of them are sometimes later shown to certain selected officials.

Cuba is grappling with a financial liquidity crisis triggered by the global recession which forced it to slash imports by 37 percent last year. Inefficiencies in the centralized economy have also reduced productivity.

Murillo said the Caribbean nation could no longer afford, for example, to pay tens of thousands of people to control state barber shops, beauty parlors and services such as appliance and watch repair shops. He suggested they could be administered differently by leasing them to workers, according to two people who also saw the video of his speech.

The economy minister, a former military officer appointed to the post a year ago, denounced those who might resist the changes, which appear to be underway in small experiments.

"I was called to a meeting last month and told the premises would be leased to employees soon as part of an experiment in the area," the administrator of a state-run beauty parlor in central Havana said, asking that her name not be cited.

A pilot project in Havana, the capital, has some state taxi drivers leasing their vehicles at a daily rate instead of receiving a wage, drivers said.



DECENTRALIZATION, COOPERATIVES, LEASING

Universities in a number of provinces have been asked to draw up proposals to transform local state-run services and minor production activity into cooperatives.

Professors who attended a similar presentation by Murillo at Havana University earlier this year said he made clear that economic necessity, not ideological choice, was driving change and that reforms already underway in agriculture were a model for what would come.

"He pointed to decentralization of agriculture and the various forms of property such as cooperatives and land leasing as a model for local production and services," said one of the professors, who, like the others, asked not to be identified due to restrictions on communication with foreign journalists.

President Castro has bemoaned the state-run economy's inefficiency and called for decentralization, local initiative and new forms of property management in non-strategic sectors. He also has said numerous state subsidies are no longer sustainable, a point Murillo repeated, the sources said.

"Raul Castro has no illusions about how the all-embracing paternalism of the past has left the Cuban economy in ruins," Brian Latell, a former CIA analyst who closely follows Cuban affairs, said.

"His dilemma is in the implementation of decentralizing reforms. Doing nothing, or proceeding too quickly could both have destabilizing consequences," Latell said.



MILITARY TECHNOCRATS

Raul Castro has appointed a number of military officers to the Economy and Planning Ministry, which insiders say is now the operational headquarters for his economic reform efforts.

When he was appointed minister, Murillo came with a new first deputy minister, General Adel Izquierdo, who was head of the military's economic department when Raul Castro served as defense minister.

Murillo quickly named Colonel Amando Perez Betancourt, the architect of efforts to make the military's state-run suppliers more efficient, as another deputy minister.

The minister, in both speeches, said the proposed solutions to Cuba's economic problems must come from the local level, and will differ from place to place and sector to sector.

"He said that while taxi drivers, beauticians and others might lease their equipment or places of work in the capital, that would not necessarily apply to other cities or state-run eateries where different solutions might prove more beneficial," one of the two people who saw the video said.

(Editing by Jeff Franks,

Cuba's public "privatization" debate

Cuba's Communist Party newspaper has been publishing unusually frank criticisms of Cuban socialism.

By Nick Miroff
Published: February 9, 2010 06:29 ET

HAVANA, Cuba — Something unusual has been stirring lately in the pages of Granma, this country’s largest newspaper and the official mouthpiece of the Cuban Communist Party.

Lacking commercial advertising and printed entirely in red and black ink, Granma typically carries eight tabloid-style pages devoted to fawning coverage of Cuba’s top officials and the latest iniquities of Yankee imperialism. Its primary function is to promote the Cuban government, rather than cover it, offering an Orwellian chronicle of life on the island as a never-ending series of socialist triumphs.

But in recent months, Granma has become an unlikely forum for a debate that seems to portend much-expected reforms to Cuba’s state-run economy.

A flurry of op-ed columns have appeared lately in the paper’s “letters to the editor” section, staking out positions for and against something Cubans are calling “privatization” — small-scale liberalization measures that might allow more entrepreneurship and private business. At its roots, it is an argument over how to revive Cuba’s anemic economy, which was already woefully inefficient and unproductive before the global recession hit.

Most surprising, at least for the pages of Granma, is that many of the editorials contain rather frank criticisms of Cuba’s economic ills, which include petty corruption, the widespread theft of state goods and a low-wage system that pushes Cubans into black-market activity to make ends meet.

“What would it mean for the State to eliminate the ongoing farce of state-owned property?” asked one letter, signed by D. Gonzalez de la Cruz. Pilfering is so rife at state-run businesses that they’re already being privatized, he argued.

“In our current situation, privatization is already happening” Gonzalez wrote. “Only instead of a rational and well-thought-out process, it’s chaotic and perverse. What kind of social benefits do we get from state-run business and restaurants where the State pays the bills but the profits — obtained fraudulently and illegally — go into the pockets of the those who prey off the people and the State?”

The letters in Granma appear to be part of a broader re-examination of Cuban socialism called for in speeches by President Raul Castro, raising hopes and expectations among Cubans who struggle with constant shortages and a system that officially bans most forms of private commerce. Of course, the debates are bound by certain unspoken parameters, and do not contain calls for free-market capitalism nor any direct political criticism of Cuba’s leaders.

Rather, they are framed as a discussion about the best way to save Cuban socialism and its vaunted social safety net from an underachieving economy choked by excessive centralization and bureaucracy.

“I’m concerned about the future of my country, and it worries me that some still blindly believe that the old economic model we have is perfect,” wrote J. Gonzalez Fernandez in another Granma editorial, saying that he is a 28-year-old whose views are shared by “almost all young people.”

“We can’t keep living in the past. We have to think about the present and future of our country,” he wrote, adding that he believed “adjusting” socialism was needed to ensure its survival.

What’s not clear is when economic reforms may be enacted, nor how extensive they may be. With frustrations running high, many insist changes can’t wait. Even Cuba’s Catholic Church weighed in last week, publishing an editorial written by priest and economist P. Boris Moreno, who warned of “socioeconomic collapse” if reforms aren’t made.

And yet, if “privatization” is being floated in Granma and other official newspapers, does it indicate some package of liberalization measures have already been decided upon by the Castro government?

“I think these are changes that almost everyone supports, including many Communist Party militants, but I don’t know when they may occur” said dissident economist Oscar Espinosa Chepe, who said he has been followed the debates “with great interest.”

“Raul Castro raised a lot of expectations, and people are growing frustrated he hasn’t done anything,” he said.

Since Raul Castro officially took over Cuba’s presidency from his elder brother in 2008, his government has enacted modest reforms to Cuba’s agricultural sector, putting unproductive state land in the hands of private farmers and cooperatives. But many services and small businesses — from watch repair to fast-food restaurants to bakeries — remain in state hands.

And not everyone seems eager for that to change, as other editorials appearing in Granma have urged “not to give capitalism an inch.”

“Now is not the time to create the conditions for the reintroduction of clever and treacherous capitalism into our homeland,” wrote J.L. Valdes Carrasco, exhorting readers to work harder, produce more food, and “place absolute trust in the leaders of the Revolution,” while calling on young people to “lead in the decisive stage of the Revolution,” the term used on the island to refer to the Castros’ socialist system.

One interesting feature of the Granma debates is that many of those who have submitted letters for and against economic reforms try to bolster their arguments by borrowing quotes from Fidel Castro’s speeches. Gonzalez, the 28-year-old, cited Castro’s words from a 2000 May Day speech in making his case: “Revolution is everything that should be changed.”

That partisans on both sides would quote Castro may be a preview of the political debates likely to ensue once he, Raul, and their generation of Cuban leaders is gone, and younger Cubans are left to sort out the island’s problems.


http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/cuba/100205/privatization-granma-liberalization

Cuban Resistance to Reform

Cuba slow to ease its grip on shopkeepers
By Marc Frank in Camagüey

Published: February 10 2010 02:00 | Last updated: February 10 2010 02:00

Three years after Cuba's Rebel Youth newspaper published "The Big Old Swindle" - a scathing series calling for reform of a state-managed retail sector beset by poor management, corruption and abysmal service - debate is still raging over liberalisation. The authorities have yet to act.

Rumours abound in Havana that the state will soon cede control over its thousands of barber shops, cafeterias, bakeries and domestic appliance and car repair businesses, opting to regulate and tax rather than administer, along the lines of the Chinese or Vietnamese model.

Yet the state appears to be doing the opposite, remodelling and opening numerous restaurants, shops and other retail outlets in city after city.

Raúl Castro, president, has insisted that Cuba's Soviet-style command economy needs fixing. He has hinted that ways must be found to reform the retail sector since taking over from his ailing brother, Fidel Castro, two years ago.

"State companies must be efficient and so must have resources to be so. The rest should adapt to more adequate forms of property given the resources available," stated a report by the economy ministry last year soon after Mr Castro replaced the minister and his top deputies.

Mr Castro has been short on specifics. However, commentators, economists and analysts propose raising the small number of family businesses and allowing employees to form co-operatives like those long established in agriculture.

There is apparently fierce resistance within the ruling Communist party, especially in the provinces.

"Cuba is not Havana," a provincial-level party official in eastern Cuba quipped when asked to square the new government-run retail outlets with the idea that the state should get out of the sector.

Pressed, he conceded that the state did not need to run some services, such as every barber shop. But he opposed letting go of larger establishments, such as car repair shops.

"Most cars and trucks in this country are owned by the state," he said.

A mid-level party cadre who administered eateries in the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba insisted the retail sector's poor performance was not systemic but subjective. Fixing it was just a matter of improving party discipline, she said.

Cuba's second city has opened more restaurants, bars, stores and other establishments during the past year than any other.

The administrator, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the province's new party leader, Lazaro Exposito Canto, had improved the sector. "Since his arrival the retail sector has been completely turned round. It is a matter of caring about the people and being demanding with subordinates," she said.

The debate has spilled into the pages of Granma, the Communist party daily, which has carried letters to the editor for and against reform. "We have to shake off the stereotype developed over many years that private property is always evil," González de la Cruz wrote in a recent edition.

"Property, state or private, is valid when it serves a social purpose," he said.

The opposing view was best expressed in Granma by Guerra González, another correspondent.

"The solution of creating new owners and co-operatives and making current employees into supposed collective owners [in the retail sector] will only lead to uncontrolled free competition and capitalism," he wrote, adding, "this would represent not only an economic step backward but a political, social and ideological one".

For the first time since all retail activity - right down to shoe-shine boys - was nationalised in the "revolutionary offensive" of 1968, licences are being handed out to food vendors in the interior who have played cat-and-mouse with police in city streets for decades, saving residents a long walk to state markets.

But that appears to be part of reform already under way in the agriculture sector, where decision-making and food distribution has been decentralised and state lands leased to more than 100,000 farmers.

Authorities, in an apparent concession to popular frustration, are also granting family farms and cooperatives permission to sell a part of what they produce directly using kiosks and horse and bicycle-drawn carts. But not a single state-run retail outlet has been handed over to employees as a co-operative, let alone privatised.