14ymedio, 12 June 2015 – Cuba expects to enact a “Enterprise Law” in 2017 in line with the economic reforms initiated by president Raul Castro in his attempt to “update” the Socialist system on the Island, according to an official announcement this week.
The new legislation “will reflect the principles, characteristics and performance requisites of enterprises,” said Grisel Trista Arbesu, head of the organization responsible for the reforms, the Enterprise Refinement for the Implementation and Development of the Guidelines.
The official, who participated in a two-day workshop held in Havana under the name Challenges of the Cuban Economy, said that 2015 “will be the first year that all measures converge to provide the Socialist state enterprise more autonomy and powers in pursuit of greater efficiency and productivity.”
According to what Trista said during the workshop, attended by 645 specialists, managers and academics from across the country, among the changes the most important was “the separation of business and government functions.”
The Government considers that the “update” has allowed state enterprises to restructure both to strengthen the nation’s productive sector and to increase system capacity.
State enterprises continue to make up Cuba’s basic economic model, regulated by legislation passed in 1987. Since officially taking office in 2008, President Raul Castro has tried to gradually reduce the weight of a bloated public sector through measures promoting self-employment, not without multiple obstacles, however.
