Translator: Regina Anavy – Page 119

An Old Man Who Made a Living as a Coachman in Villa Clara is Murdered

Images of Osvaldo, the coachman killed in Villa Clara, shared on social networks. (Facebook)

14ymedio, Havana, 21 December 2022 — Osvaldo, an old man who made a living transporting people in a wagon, was allegedly killed on Sunday for his horse in the municipality of Encrucijada, Villa Clara. His death generated a wave of indignation among his relatives, who remembered the Colonel, as he was known, as a humble man willing to help the neighbors.

The crime, of which the authorities have not offered an official version, was reported on social networks. His family and friends reported his disappearance after not returning from a trip he had scheduled for Sunday morning. On the night of that same day, several Facebook users reported the discovery of his body in a cane field, beheaded and with one hand cut off, while the wagon and the horse were stolen.

“Who did this barbarity of killing a poor old man has to pay for it. I ask everyone who saw something, please let me know,” a user identified as Reinaldo Rodríguez Velásquez wrote on Facebook. Several commentators said that the Colonel’s family alerted the Police about his disappearance, but the officers did not take the case seriously because 72 hours had not yet passed.

Osvaldo, whose surnames aren’t yet known, was described as “a humble man, good neighbor and friend of all,” by the user Ana Laura Bacallo, who claimed to know the victim from a young age. “All the memories I have of him are how he helped neighbors, and he never had problems with anyone,” she added. continue reading

The violent theft of animals in Cuban fields has been increasing over the last two years. A report published in this newspaper last July set out the methods of thieves to steal livestock, small and large, on private farms.

The criminals study the place and the owners of the animals well, and make use of different pain killers to tranquilize oxen, cows and pigs, which they then transport in wagons or dismember in the same place. The situation is increasingly common in Villa Clara and other provinces of central Cuba, where, in addition to animals being used in agricultural work, they serve as a means of transport in cities.

In the absence of an efficient urban transport system, cities such as Santa Clara, Remedios and Encrucijada depend on wagons or cars towed by horses. While it is true that they alleviate the lack of buses and electric motorcycles, they engender a significant amount of dirt, accidents and animal abuse.

Often, horses used for transportation must carry several times their weight under the whip of the coachmen. The situation becomes even more regrettable during the summer months, when animals tend to faint from fatigue and dehydration. Carers usually keep their animals in improvised stables in their own homes or on the outskirts of cities. It is common that violent robberies also occur there, with the aim of taking the horse, which they transport to another municipality or province so as not to be recognized, or kill it for food.

Cuba is facing a growing wave of violence, unleashed in part by the deep economic crisis on the Island. Last July, Santiago Morgado, a professor in Sancti Spíritus, was killed with the aim of stealing a motorcycle that the murderers later tried to sell for the price of 200,000 pesos. The official newspaper Escambray revealed that five individuals had been involved in Morgado’s death. The 62-year-old man was found several days after his death in a well where his perpetrators had thrown him.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuban Authorities Get Fruit for Tourism and Export, But it is Not Available for Island Residents

The Government allocates a good part of fruit production for the consumption of tourists and export. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 21 December 2022 — The Cuban Government allocates fruits considered “select” for export and for tourists who arrive on the Island, while in the markets where Cuban families buy, it is increasingly difficult and expensive to get the products grown in the fields of the Island.

The official press has dedicated extensive articles this week to explain how Cuba is preparing to deal with the high season of tourism, which this year has left results below the projections, and it also discusses the authorization of production lines for export, mainly to Europe.

In total, the authorities recognize that Cienfuegos province has 74 local development projects, but only 14 (19%) have potential for exports and tourism. Thus, María del Carmen Serra Lliraldi, director of the Chamber of Commerce in the region, explained that the main limitation is compliance with the production plan for sugar, chewing tobacco, charcoal, hot pepper, shrimp, catfish and aluminum scrap.

The company Frutas Selectas is, in any case, in charge of “balancing” the assortments for “all tourist markets” on the Island, Clemente Hernández Rojas, director of the state-owned company, told the newspaper Escambray, adding that the company meets 70% of the demand. “We are the most specialized, with refrigerator infrastructure and a mini-industry with better technologies that currently produces seven lines, while we have a connection for specific assortments such as lemons with a producer of Meneses,” he said. continue reading

Hernández Rojas said that the company, whose inventories depend on local production, has met the demands for tourism corresponding to three months, with agreements between producers to provide 320 tons of onion bulbs, of which 220 are provided by Frutas Selectas. The rest, he added without specifying a figure, will be marketed by the Empresa Agropecuaria Banao.

The official pointed out that, to respond to the “state order,” Frutas Selectas has expanded its freezing capacity by up to 40 tons in the Yayabo factory, and has also installed a room to store agricultural products.

This same company announced a year ago with great fanfare the export of lemons to Spain by a farmer, after the Government endorsed the trade of the private sector. On that occasion, this newspaper verified that the product did not, in fact, appear in the Spanish markets.

This Monday it was reported that the Empresa de Acopio in Cienfuegos dispatched 62 containers in 2022 to Spain and Turkey, valued at 9 million pesos, as highlighted at a meeting of the provincial Chamber of Commerce.

Cítricos Arimao has also exported more than 1,000 tons of aseptic mango pulp to European markets, said Isec Tellería Abreu, deputy director of the company, who announced that they are preparing new production lines for exports. One corresponds to dehydrated pineapple leaves to be marketed to Russia for the rest of this month.

One of the farms in the area assured Perlavisión this September that it had a demand of 200 kilos for this product for the Russian market. “They make shoes (vegan leather), car seat linings, belts … Damn, everything is made with the pineapple leaf and the banana,” said the producer.

In addition, turmeric, avocado, mango, red mamey and frozen cassava will be incorporated for export by 2023.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba Needs More Than 300,000 Tourists in December to Achieve its Annual Goal

Cuba has barely recovered 42% of the tourism lost in the pandemic, compared to 88% in Western Europe and 63% in the world as a whole. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 21 December 2022 — The worst omens of Cuba’s tourism sector are being fulfilled. With the November data, published this Tuesday by the National Bureau of Statistics and Information (ONEI), 1,377,253 international visitors have been received so far this year, which means that Cuba needs to receive 332,747 foreign tourists to meet its forecast for this year.

The projected number for 2022 was initially 2.5 million travelers, but the authorities admitted the huge gap between desire and reality and warned that, ultimately, the year would close with 1,710,000. The possibility of reaching that number is minimal despite the fact that these last two months are high season on the Island. Despite this, November, which was the best month of 2022, attracted 178,851 foreign tourists, and it is unlikely that the amount will double this December.

This month’s figures show another almost unprecedented factor, as pointed out by Cuban economist Pedro Monreal, who periodically analyzes the numbers. “The Cuban community abroad provides one of the most interesting data from tourism statistics in Cuba for the January-November 2022 stage, by representing just over a fifth of the total number of visitors (21.5%), surpassing the record of 16% in 2019.”

The number of Cubans residing abroad who traveled to the Island was 296,533, a number that even exceeds the total of the five main European travelers: Spain (75,116), Germany (52,496), England (42,583), France (39,597) and Italy (36,617). In addition, together with Canada, they add up to more than 52% of the tourism that the Island receives, a trend that gives strength to the opinion that the Cuban exile tends to gradually become more of an economic than a political migrant. continue reading

Canadians continue to lead the list of nationalities with the highest presence in tourism statistics, although the decline continues. Between January and November 2019 travelers from Canada numbered 1,120,077, but the number now remains at only 428,146. The Russian numbers are also still in free fall and, with just 47,760 visitors this November, confirm that what was beginning to be an upward trend is retreating by leaps and bounds. Even in the disastrous year of 2021, 131,821 Russians arrived on the Island.

The Government highlights in its press release that the number reached in November represents 539.8% more than in 2021, the worst year of the pandemic in Cuba. However, in the same time period in 2019, the last year without restrictions due to COVID-19, Cuba had received almost 4 million tourists, 190% more. The data show the Island’s inability to recover, an anomaly on the international scene.

At the end of November, the World Tourism Organization was hopeful for the recovery data of the sector at the international level, which is at 63% of the 2019 levels as a whole. Europe clearly leads the improvement, with 81% already in September. Cuba, which in the pre-pandemic closed with 4.2 million tourists, will have barely recovered 42% if it achieves the feat of reaching the goal predicted by Alejandro Gil, Minister of Economy.

In addition, the constant decline of the sector for the Island, which registered 4.7 million tourists in 2018, is confirmed.

Despite the nefarious data, the Government continues to bet on tourism as a life-saving sector. The largest amounts of money, such as the 1.5 billion dollars dedicated to the construction of hotels, has been invested since 2020. In the 2023 portfolio of opportunities, there are at least three projects for luxury tourism worth more than $3 billion.

In addition, the Cuban food sector almost daily announces new products for commercialization in hotels while the population fights for a little pork for this Christmas.

Last November, the Cuban Minister of Tourism, Juan Carlos García Granda, projected 3 million visitors for 2023 at an industry event held in London. There he argued that the collection of foreign currency is essential to improve the lives of Cubans. “Tourism serves to reactivate thermoelectric plants, to buy more food, to give raw materials to producers, to give more well-being and quality of life to the people in general,” he said.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Economic Inequalities in Cuba are Increasing

Fidel Castro dedicating himself to the cultivation of moringa. (EFE)

14ymedio, Elías Amor Bravo, Economist, 21 December 2022 — When it comes to the analysis of the Cuban economy, the same conclusion can always be reached: the communist model of intervention and maximum control of the means of production has caused enormous inequalities and injustices in society. But in the absence of a Gini index for Cuba, which would measure income inequality and other similar indicators, the regime shields itself in the positions it occupies in the United Nations human development indices.

The reality, however, is far away, and you don’t see it in what the state press reports these days. There are two news reports, and each one is more distant and different. On the one hand, we have First Prime Minister Marrero celebrating the fifth anniversary of the founding of the Center for Research of Protein Plants and Bionatural Products, an entity that, like other similar ones, was created by Fidel Castro when he became obsessed with the food properties of moringa. There is that center, which has been operating for five years like everything else in Cuba, throwing away public spending, as if the money fell from the sky.

Marrero highlighted in his speech the influence of Castro on the programs of this entity, which has as its fundamental objective to contribute to the improvement of the health and food of the people, with something as “essential” as leaves of the moringa tree. There are still those who remember Castro in his last years, walking among the trees and confirming that, even in those final moments of his life, he was not willing to leave a puppet and wanted to impose his own irrelevant ideas.

Marrero said that “Fidel Castro said that these solutions could mitigate the negative impact of food crises and contribute to the Food and Nutritional Sovereignty Program,” the same program against which Díaz-Canel lashed out in the assembly a few days ago, in one of the few moments of lucidity of the communist leader, saying that a law was useless if the farmers didn’t produce.

Marrero described the center as a model for the program of protein forage plants and stressed that, among its challenges, it tries to “bring innovation and training to the different productive scenarios for the recovery of livestock, to advance in the scientific lines linked to biomedicine and to consolidate its management model with the stable functioning of the more than 49 work groups created.” When it comes to creating structures dependent on the budgeted sector that increase the deficit, Cuban communists do not skimp on expenses. continue reading

So, even though this center must “develop sustainable value chains by obtaining new scientific results and bring innovation to the spaces and sectors of society where possible to achieve sovereignty and food and nutritional security of the population,” the results are still far from being produced. For everything else, it is intended that “the generalization of the experiences of the center take place” assuming that its results, which have not yet taken place, will certainly be produced.

In short, a center and an act tailored to Marrero, to testify to his loyalty to Fidel Castro in times when the Castro regime is at a complex crossroads.

And here come the injustices.

Because in the same edition of Granma, there is other information that shows the enormous inequalities that exist on the Island. From the neatness of the moringa research center and the comfort of the Havana convention center, to the sad reality of the dirt floors that exist in numerous homes, especially in the rural municipalities of the interior of the country. Yes. You heard right. This is one of the challenges of housing policy in Cuba: the program for the eradication of dirt floors in the country. And they’ve been facing the challenge for 63 years and haven’t been able to do anything about it.

Now it turns out that the situation is aggravated, above all by the embargo/blockade, but also by the reduction in the production of various construction materials (including cement, sand aggregate and steel), which “has had notable effects on the program, along with structural changes and financial impacts that limit its application to numerous users.”

The information refers to the province of Granma, one of the most affected with 35,834 homes with dirt floors, a figure that may even be higher. Five years ago, it exceeded 53,000 in the territory. For this year, some 4,439 floors had been planned, of which only 1,462 had been completed by the beginning of December, a budget that does not exceed 50% of the integral financing that was initially foreseen. At this rate, not even in ten years will they solve the challenge.

To this is added the increased cost of the action to eliminate dirt floors in the last two years, exceeding 15,000 pesos; that is, the elimination of a floor in a house of about 538 square feet could be on the order of 25,000 pesos (about 138 dollars at the informal exchange rate).

Also, many of the homes are illegal and not recognized in the province’s housing fund, which limits the constructive actions on the terms indicated.

When the state organization fails, those affected try alternatives, but they are not sufficiently exploited either by the state entities, which can produce them, or by the customers themselves, through their own effort, so everything ends badly. The communists are still determined to direct and monitor the process, but it is getting worse and worse, and they are not able to efficiently take advantage of the natural resources of the municipalities, or provide local development programs that are useful. The limitations in the production of cement by the national industry condition any approach, and therefore, homes continue to have dirt floors. And the cost of repair is about 138 dollars.

What solutions do the communists offer? The furthest from reality, and all of them out of the state budget.

First, extending production to the territories, which goes against reaching the technical scale of production with larger series that would reduce unit costs to a minimum.

Second, producing alternatives to cement, such as trimmed marble or extenders, like LC3 cement and others obtained from lime and zeolite, with the aim of doubling the strength of the cement.

Third, the reality of the problem requires greater efficiency, control and agility in productive objectives. And this from the state is going to be very complicated.

From moringa research to rural homes with dirt floors. Two realities that clash in the communist economic model of the revolution, and that are presented before the eyes of society analysts as two examples of the poor coordination of the regime’s decisions under the state budgets.

Here you should ask yourself, what is the priority for a government that claims to be a defender of the poor? And then see what is really the priority. The hotel rooms? The moringa research center? The inequalities are scandalous.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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If He Has ‘Breached the Rules’ He Must ‘Leave the Country,’ Bolivia Says About the Expelled Cuban Activist

Cuban activist Magdiel Jorge Castro in front of the Directorate of Migration where he was summoned on December 19, 2022. (@mjorgec1994/Twitter)

14ymedio/EFE, Havana, 21 December 2022 — The Bolivian Government announced on Wednesday the expulsion of Cuban activist Magdiel Jorge Castro, made public on Monday.

The Minister of Government (Interior), Eduardo del Castillo, told the media, including the Spanish agency EFE, that “any foreign citizen who settles in national territory must comply with legal and current regulations” and that if the General Directorate of Migration has determined that the Cuban citizen has “breached the rules” then he must “leave the country.”

“Any citizen who violates our regulations, who commits offenses or crimes, will have to comply with the corresponding sanction,” Del Castillo said.

Magdiel Jorge Castro said on his networks on Wednesday that he presented an appeal for reversal of the order, which forces him to leave Bolivia, where he now resides, within the next 15 working days. “I will wait for the response within the deadlines that Bolivian law determines,” he tweeted.

On Monday, the activist denounced his case, and told this newspaper that when he arrived at Migration, where he was summoned, “there was a whole folder with my tweets, as State Security tends to do in Cuba.” He asked which of his publications violated the law but “they didn’t know how to tell me.”

The immigration order, shown to this newspaper, indicates that Castro “infringed Bolivian regulations, altering public order through social networks.” Therefore, the text, dated December 16, 2022, continues, “he is granted the temporary mandatory exit order.”

By “acts that alter public order,” the document cites, “participation and/or incitement to unrest, confrontation between citizens and acts against morality and/or dignity.”

On Tuesday, Castro gave an interview to Cuban influencer Alex Otaola, where he described the Bolivian government’s decision as “political persecution” against him, while warning of the dangerous precedent this sets for other Cubans seeking asylum in third countries. continue reading

Bolivia and Cuba moved closer again with the Government of Luis Arce, after the suspension of diplomatic relations with Cuba by the then-interim president of Bolivia, Jeanine Áñez, who is now in prison.

The Bolivian president was received last week by his Cuban counterpart, Miguel Díaz-Canel, in Havana, where he also attended the extraordinary session of the National Assembly in commemoration of the eighteenth anniversary of the creation of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America – Treaty of Commerce of the Peoples (Alba-TCP).

For Castro, as he stated in his conversation with Otaola, this visit is directly related to his expulsion from Bolivia.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Cuba Runs Out of Baseball Players: Another Five Run Away

Five players increase the bleeding of athletes before the end of the year. (Collage)

14ymedio, Havana, 21 December 2022 — Five more Cuban players joined the long list of dropouts in recent weeks. The experienced Héctor Miguel Ponce, Javier Camero and Edwin Vassell are already in the United States, revealed journalist Francys Romero, while Ernest Machado and Erik Matos have settled in the Dominican Republic.

Ponce is a benchmark pitcher for the Industriales team, and between 2021 and 2022 he also participated in the Italian circuit, where he played for Cagliari and Brescia. He left a mark with a pitching average of 127.2 innings, and he struck out 138 batters.

This is the second exit of this habanero, because in 2016 he was already looking for fortune outside. However, a few months later and in the face of the disinterest of foreign teams in hiring him, he decided to return to Cuba. Director Guillermo Carmona included him in January of this year on his list of pitchers, proclaiming that his staff “has 9 pitchers who are capable of throwing a 90 mph ball” and that he has assembled what was needed to “minimize the impact of some absences,” published the official media Jit.

Camero was key in the national title of Matanzas two years ago. The commentator for the defunct Metropolitanos team, Iván Alonso, called him “an elegant batter,” because he “emerged like a star from the youth world championships,” according to Swing Completo. Specialists refer to this athlete as an “explosive” man “with punch” on the baseball diamond.

“Camero intervened in two matches of the current Elite League with Centrales. After that, he made his way to the United States. He is 32 years old, and in his last three National Series he hit more than .300 with Matanzas,” Francys Romero said. continue reading

For his part, Vassell had a place within the Cienfuegos team. Like Ponce, this baseball player had already tried his luck in the Professional League of Venezuela in 2015, but unexpectedly returned to the Island. Today he is in the United States, where he is looking for a better future.

On Tuesday, the stay in the Dominican Republic of the Under-15 baseball players, Ernest Machado and Erik Matos, was also confirmed. With these departures “there are already five members of the last World Cup” of the youth category who are looking for better opportunities for sports development abroad, according to Baseball FR!

“Most likely and with the economic situation prevailing in Cuba, half of the members of this team will end up leaving the country,” Romero stressed.

In the U-15 World Cup held in Mexico, Machado launched 3.1 innings without allowing home runs or steals. This right-hand pitcher from the province of Artemis has qualities and hopes to perfect his game in the Dominican Republic.

Meanwhile, Matos, at the age of 15, has a powerful right and has scored throws of between 88 and 90 miles per hour.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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‘The Armed Wing of Cuban State Security Acts in Bolivia’

Cuban activist Magdiel Jorge Castro, on his departure from the immigration offices where he was informed of his expulsion from Bolivia. (Screen capture)

14ymedio, Madrid, 19 December 2022 — Cuban activist Magdiel Jorge Castro, who disseminates information and opinions through social networks, received an expulsion order from Bolivia, where he resides, on Monday. He has 15 days to leave the country, as he said through a direct broadcast on Twitter.

“The justification they use are my publications on social networks, publications that are basically against the Cuban government, against the dictatorship, and denunciations of human rights violations,” Castro told 14ymedio by phone.

The young man says that when he arrived at Migration, “there was a whole folder with my tweets, as State Security tends to do in Cuba.” He asked which of his publications violated the law, he says, “and they didn’t know how to tell me.”

The immigration resolution, which this newspaper accessed, indicated that Castro “infringed on Bolivian regulations, altering public order through social networks.” “Therefore,” the text, dated December 16, 2022, continues, “the temporary mandatory exit resolution is granted.”

By “acts that alter public order,” the document indicates “participation and/or incitement to riots, confrontation between citizens and acts against morality and/or dignity.” continue reading

Before the summons received last Friday, Castro says, he had not been contacted or warned.

“I want to make it very clear that my publications, which can be accessed because my public profile is there, have never alluded to Bolivian national policy and exclusively mention my country,” defends Castro, who does not yet know if he is going to appeal the ruling, for which he has three days.

What he does plan to continue doing is to report it. “It seems a hugely arbitrary, but I find it even more scandalous that Bolivia lends its public institutions to the armed wing of Cuban State Security to come here and manage at will the rule of law of a sovereign country such as the Plurinational State of Bolivia.”

There is no record of a similar case that has occurred for any other Cuban.

After the suspension of diplomatic relations with Cuba by the then-interim president of Bolivia, Jeanine Áñez, who today is in prison, still without trial, for, according to her persecutors, having organized a “coup d’état,” both countries approached the government of Luis Arce again.

The Bolivian president was received a few days ago by his Cuban counterpart, Miguel Díaz-Canel, in Havana, where he also attended the extraordinary session of the National Assembly in commemoration of the eighteenth anniversary of the creation of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America – People’s Trade Treaty (Alba-TCP).

⚠️⚠️#Urgente. He sido expulsado del Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia en una decisión política que marca un precedente nefasto… pido a todos que compartan!!#AbajoLaDictadura pic.twitter.com/Tx1sp2pHl1

— Mag Jorge Castro?? (@mjorgec1994) December 19, 2022

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Scarcely 59 Percent of Passenger Transport in Cuba is Operating

Caption: In some provinces, the availability of vehicles doesn’t even reach 30%. (14ymedio)

14ymedio, Havana, 12 December 2022 — Passenger transport in Cuba is in a limited situation, as revealed this Sunday in the parliamentary committee on attention to services, which took place in the presence of the Prime Minister, Manuel Marrero Cruz. The plan has been fulfilled by just 59%, said Eduardo Rodríguez Dávila, Minister of Transport, since it was intended to reach 1.733 billion passenger trips* (17% less than before the pandemic), and only 1.5 billion can be transported.

The reasons are the lack of fuel and technical capacity, which, in turn, causes losses for the sector. According to the report, the technical availability coefficient, which determines the proportion of vehicles in useful condition, is barely 42%, but there are areas where the figure sinks even lower, such as Pinar del Río (30%), Guantánamo (26%) and Santiago de Cuba (23%).

By company, National Buses is meeting 48% of the plan (and covers only 43% of interprovincial routes compared to 2019); Transmetre, is at 50%, and Escolares, is at 53%. The Turquino Plan, which connects the mountainous and inaccessible areas of the Island, has 110 of its 198 routes not in service, which is more worrying.

The railway is not going well either, and this is nothing new, since cars are missing and the infrastructure is not in good condition, which reduces capacity. According to the data, locomotives — the few there are — could carry 12 or 13 cars but must take only 11. continue reading

By sea, there are more problems. Perseverance, a modern ferry acquired for millions from an undisclosed Asian country arrived on the Island in the midst of great expectation this July. But it still cannot operate because the dredging of the port of Batabanó has not been completed.

By air, although the drop in flights has been evident, signs of recovery are seen, the authorities added.

Another fact that they highlighted as striking is the fall in transport licenses for private individuals, who move 30% of passengers. A quarter of these have suspended or cancelled their permits, something that is no surprise other than to the authorities, who seem unconcerned about the drivers’ complaints. They are tired of state price limitations, which are impossible to sustain, together with the increase in the cost of fuel and the price of parts needed to maintain their vehicles.

“Many charge high prices with the aim of meeting expenses. At the end of September, these forms of transport had only transported 44% of what was planned,” the report says.

“One of the most complex issues facing the population is prices. It is true that private carriers have to buy dollars in the informal market to acquire parts and pieces, but nothing justifies that they want to have up to three times the profits with their activity,” said the prime minister.

The Economic Affairs Committee, despite its importance, offered little data of interest, although there were many words from the Cuban president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, who used the usual recipe of voluntarism** for next year. “The plan is a goal that requires effort to be fulfilled,” he said.

He also resorted to referring to the US sanctions and the international crisis that worsen, in his opinion, the country’s problems, but added that “with creative resistance we will win,” and that this is “a path that involves sacrifices.” Nothing new here.

Perhaps the biggest surprise was that generated by his words regarding inflation. According to the president, “although things are expensive there is a group that can buy them; hence the high prices continue to be maintained. How is this resolved? Producing more, but currency is needed,” he said, to support his statement about the excess liquidity that, in his opinion, exists on the Island.

Díaz-Canel also stressed the energy problems, which any country, he said, would “solve with shock measures” (that is, increasing prices, as he insinuated, ignoring measures such as European consumer protection measures to try to contain the increase), while in Cuba, each megawatt costs one million dollars, and that amount “is not generated by the Electric Union nor is it financed by the rates fixed for the population sector,” he recalled.

The parliamentary committee brought to light other worrying issues, such as the lack of food production. The goal for the new year in terms of the sugar harvest is to produce 455,200 tons, 90,000 of them for export (the contract with China was originally for 400,000 tons), but the yield is very low, according to the data presented: an alarming 7.9% of the goal.

The deputies gathered there took the floor to allude to issues that concern everyone but which will not be solved without a real will for change. Among them were the rise in prices in the state sector, the impossibility of acquiring more and more products in a place other than foreign exchange stores, the high losses of many state companies without consequences for them, and the catastrophic situation of the thermoelectric plants — despite the vaunted capital repair of the rebel Guiteras plant, which doesn’t work for a week in a row — while resources are allocated to other matters.

The deputy for Cienfuegos, Dinorah Navarro, admitted that there is dissatisfaction among the workers of the thermoelectric plants and alluded to the investments made in tourism, with an ambiguous statement: “We do nothing and continue to build hotels while the thermoelectric plants remain in these conditions.”

Translator’s notes:

*To put these numbers in context, Cuba’s population is approximately 11.3 million. If each person took one transit trip a day, every day, for the entire year, it would total just over 4.124 billion annual trips.

**”Voluntarism” means individual effort.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Delay in the Validation of Cuban Vaccines by the WHO is ‘The Fault of the Banks’

According to official data, more than 87% of Cubans have received the complete three-dose scheme of one of the three vaccines against COVID-19. (EFE)

14ymedio, Havana, 19 December 2022 — The process of recognition by the World Health Organization (WHO) for Abdala, the Cuban vaccine against COVID-19, remains halted after the documentation was delivered to the health authorities in April. Eight months later, Eduardo Martínez Díaz, president of the BioCubaFarma business group, assures the State newspaper Granma that the problem lies in the American embargo, which forces the banks not to work with the Island.

The doctor explains to the Communist Party newspaper that “one of the components of the evaluation process is behind schedule.” BioCubaFarma announced months ago that it had decided to transfer the production of one of Abdala’s components to its new plant in the Mariel Special Development Zone (ZEDM). WHO experts planned to visit and evaluate the factory by the end of this year, but it will not be possible to do so.

“Although the production line, where the formulation, filling and packaging operations of that complex take place are already active and producing, the line on which the recombinant products are manufactured has delays in its implementation,” says Martínez Díaz.

“This delay is due to the fact that payments have not been made to the company in charge of the commissioning of the equipment and systems of that production line. We have been trying to make payments for nine months, which have not materialized due to the refusal of several banks to make the transfer,” he concludes. The doctor is hopeful that in 2023 the study can be completed and will receive the endorsement of the health authorities, almost three years after the beginning of the pandemic. continue reading

In the interview, the expert insists that the Cuban vaccines approved on the Island — Abdala and Soberana 02 and Plus — are “safe, effective and capable of controlling the epidemic,” and that this is supported by the control of the disease in Cuba as well as in the countries that have recognized these vaccines without waiting for the WHO’s approval.

According to Martínez, eight countries have given the authorization “and others are evaluating them,” although it has only been made public, to date, that Iran, Mexico and Nicaragua have given the green light to Cuban serums. In the case of Tehran and Soberana, their manufacture is through a partnership with the Pasteur Institute. Mexico has also approved Abdala after receiving the approval of its regulator, the Federal Commission for Protection against Health Risks. Nicaragua also recognizes the two vaccines.

In addition to the previous three, Venezuela, Vietnam and Belarus have used some of the Cuban serums after receiving lots exchanged or purchased from the Island. At the moment, the number of units delivered abroad and the money obtained through their sale are unknown. The Cuban authorities announced that their vaccines would be economical, although the Nicaraguan press estimates that they cost 7 euros per unit based on a loan requested by Daniel Ortega’s government from the World Bank. However, there is no breakdown to verify the credit.

In any case, Cubans vaccinated with Abdala or Soberana — almost 100% of those immunized on the Island — have had real difficulties traveling to many countries (including the United States and the European Union) where it was mandatory to present a covid certificate or passport with one of the serums recognized by the WHO.

Martínez Díaz in his interview this Monday claims as a distinctive element of Cuban vaccines the high “thermostability” that requires less cold temperature than other vaccines (such as those of Pfizer or Moderna) and are stored at between 2 and 8 degrees. He also says that they can last up to a week at temperatures above 30 degrees celsius, “which makes them attractive for use in poor countries, where there are difficulties in maintaining the chain of refrigeration,” he adds.

The slight side effects and effectiveness that, they claim, have been demonstrated in the studies carried out on the Island, were also argued by the official despite the fact that this would not be a differentiating feature from any of the other authorized vaccines. Martínez emphasizes that the results of the research have been published in several scientific journals, which require that they be subjected to peer review. “To date, more than 20 scientific articles have been published in high-impact journals, and other reports continue to be prepared,” he says.

The doctor insists that Cuba, unlike other countries, has not suffered the onslaught of omicron, although it is hardly verifiable, since it is necessary to sequence each case to find out, something that has not been done in any country in the world and much less on the Island, where the mere diagnostic capacity was very limited at the time of the explosion of the variant. Martínez said, in any case, that this situation is due to the fact that the vaccines developed on the Island decrease their capacity against this variant by two times, while others do so by 20 times.

“This phenomenon that we are observing has its explanation in the nature of the antigen we use and the very design of our vaccines,” he explains. Martínez says that the Island’s laboratories use the RBD antigen, which produces antibodies against a region of the protein that is common in all variants of the virus.

Meanwhile, other vaccines (the ones based on messenger RNA) have used the full spike protein (S), which induces defenses against areas where there are mutations. The American Chemical Society warned at the end of 2021 of the possibility that vaccines based on protein S (Pfizer or Moderna) could fall short if the strategy was not diversified. Since then, pharmaceutical companies have been studying the situation and possible improvements.

“We defend the hypothesis that vaccines based on the RBD antigen can be a universal booster for the rest of the vaccines against COVID-19 by amplifying a protective immunity against the different variants of the Sars-Cov-2 virus, which have circulated or that could be generated in the future. Recently, several groups of scientists around the world have published articles that support this hypothesis,” says Martínez.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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Economic Reflections on the Communist Party Plenary

“The objectives of the Economy Plan for 2022 were not achieved,” Gil summarized. “The approved measures have not had the necessary impact.” (Twitter/Communist Party of Cuba)

14ymedio, Elias Amor Bravo, Economist, 10 December 2022 — Cuban communists are privileged. Not only because they hold all the power in the nation, but also because they do what they want, without giving explanations, and then in their congresses they erase any responsibility. This is what happened in the recent Political Bureau of the Central Committee when reviewing “the implementation of the ideas, concepts and guidelines derived from the Eighth Congress” and the “economic, social, political and ideological measures to face the current situation in the country.” Any decent review of these issues should lead to an assumption of responsibilities and immediate decision-making to correct errors.

But no one should expect anything from this procedure. The Party has made economic decisions like the Ordering Task,* which since January 1, 2021 has altered the lives of Cubans, throwing them into a situation of misery and poverty difficult to find in other countries. But no one has taken any responsibility for it. The so-called “accounting of the Political Bureau to the Central Committee” ends up becoming an exercise of “I wasn’t the one” that always identifies one person responsible for everything that happens to the unfortunate Antillian nation.

The Plenary of the Party is a good example of the correlation of people who lead the country with absolute power. Along with Díaz-Canel there are Esteban Lazo, Manuel Marrero, Salvador Valdés, Álvaro López Miera, representing the army, and also guests, such as Ramiro Valdés and José Ramón Machado Ventura, and the general, Joaquín Quinta Solá. A total of 108 of the 113 members of the Central Committee, and Granma says that the absences are justified. Of course.

The report of the Political Bureau, presented by Morales Ojeda, is a good example of how communists see reality and try to face it. It is as if they had a different historical time from that of society as a whole and, in a way, the problems are seen from above, as if they did not affect the single party that only understands that “we are in a scenario of progressive socioeconomic complexity, derived from the effects of the intensified blockade and the 243 measures of the Trump administration,” and to a lesser extent, “due to the erosion of the confrontation with COVID-19, the deviations from the Ordering Task and the global economic crisis, aggravated by the conflict in Ukraine.” continue reading

The Communists further explain that “to these negative elements are added the damage caused by the accidents at the Saratoga Hotel and the Matanzas Supertanker Base, the devastation of Hurricane Ian in the western provinces and the instability of the National Electricity System.”

And behind this scenario, according to the communists, appears “an aggravated situation of material deficiencies, which affects all the social and economic sectors of the country. Undersupply and inflation persist, with insufficient results in the measures adopted, which maintains a direct impact on the quality of life of the people.” No one, absolutely no one, is able to identify in this scenario of misery and poverty a self-reliance derived from the forced implementation of an economic model, the Marxist-Leninist, which is the origin of the improductivity and general inefficiency of the economy. We don’t even talk about this.

For communists, the only important thing is ideology. And instead of being interested in improving the economic conditions of the population, they warn that “the problems have been used opportunistically by the enemy, who increased the subversive and destabilizing plans, using a fierce media campaign as a spearhead, as part of a true fourth-generation or unconventional war.”

The discredit of the ruling political class in Cuba has to do with a growing detachment from society that considers that there is no measure, plan or initiative that goes well. But the communists claim that the fault lies with an alleged “external enemy” that has always been there, but that now, when the failure of the economic model is more evident, appears with more force. Don’t they realize that there’s something strange here?

The Political Bureau emphasizes above all “the intense work, extraordinary effort of the cadres, militants and, especially, of our people, trying to overcome every obstacle,” which is evidently a declaration of inefficiency, since despite that effort the goals are not achieved. But in addition, a declaration of ineffectiveness is made, because it is recognized that “not always have all the expected results been achieved,” and they announce that the solution is “unity”, the eternal communist unity that contemplates only a part of society, the communist one, as the only one able to solve problems. The rest of the options have no place in the political system. And along with unity, there is talk of the “reserves,” which is never fully understood.

So in the face of a scenario like the current one, the communists insist that progress must be made in the improvement of the methods and styles of work of the Party; in particular, the exchanges with the population, in the workplaces, in the universities, with the militancy, of the municipalities, of the cadres, in the decisions adopted by the Political Bureau. That is, internal exchanges of communists with communists, which whitewashes any state of public opinion of the population and prevents knowing the reality. It’s like navigating a sea in fog and without a compass. Cuban communists have chosen this path for a long time, and so it goes, at least in terms of economic matters.

Alternatively, they are dedicated to controlling academia, science and research, projects in municipalities and activity in communities and society. They also want to project ideology towards health workers. There is not the slightest interest in producing more and doing it efficiently. This is the least of it.

For communists, it is a priority to “raise the responsibility and attitude of the militants, paying maximum attention to the state of militancy, and the growth and quality of new members.” They received a strong blow in the last municipal elections, with the lowest levels of participation in decades, and they fear what may happen in the general elections of 2023. The truth is that these trends will continue as long as the communists pull out all the stops and have the support of the leadership of the army to remain the only party in Cuba.

What happens is that without alternatives to the economic, social, political and ideological measures to those imposed for 63 years, there is no solution. It was seen with the Ordering Task, and they are on their way to maximum separation from the people. Young Cubans know that, much better than entering a Party that doesn’t know what to do, there is no comparison to leaving the country. That’s the reality.

Communists will remain focused on the fight against what they call crime, corruption, illegalities and social indisciplines, without wanting to recognize that these behaviors take place because of the existing economic model. And that the autonomy of the socialist state enterprise has become a mantra that is difficult to achieve, since no one believes in it anymore.

Only Guilarte de Nacimiento spoke in the communist conclave about inflation, the shortage of basic products and the increase in prices. A pity. The issue arose only at the end of the report and covertly, despite the fact that in October, year-on-year inflation was already almost 40%, the highest in the world. The loss of purchasing power of wages and pensions suffered by Cubans doesn’t allow comparison worldwide, and this is an inheritance of the communists, who demanded the implementation of the Ordering Task in their previous congress, despite all the warnings. The political bureau’s report did not take into account that the main threat to Cuban communists is what they have caused themselves: inflation. We will continue to talk about it.

*Translator’s note: The “Ordering Task” [Tarea ordenamiento] is a collection of measures that include eliminating the Cuban Convertible Peso (CUC), leaving the Cuban peso as the only national currency, raising prices, raising salaries (but not as much as prices), opening stores that take payment only in hard currency which must be in the form of specially issued pre-paid debit cards, and a broad range of other measures targeted to different elements of the Cuban economy.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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More Than 17,000 Cubans Have Applied for Refuge in Mexico, Most of Them to Avoid Deportation

The Mexican Committee for Refuge Assistance (COMAR) has responded to 78,367 asylum applications in two of its offices.

14ymedio/EFE, Mexico, 15 December 2022 — The brothers José Luis and Raúl Borroto entered Mexico 40 days ago through Chiapas. “We paid the coyote $4,000 to take us to the border and he abandoned us.” These Cubans are part of the group of 368 migrants that the National Guard arrested on November 18 in the municipality of Tecpatán, in Chiapas, a state bordering Guatemala.

They spent 20 days at the Siglo XXI immigration station located in Tapachula and were released after paying a lawyer $3,700. “They threatened us with deportation if we didn’t pay; they were going to put us on a plane and return us to Cuba,” Raúl told 14ymedio. “There are many Venezuelans without documents or money. They are returning them to Guatemala.”

José Luis and Raúl left the immigration headquarters and immediately began their procedures at the Mexican Commission for Refugee Assistance (COMAR) to apply for asylum. They must show up on January 9 to find out if they were accepted. The lawyer recommended that they process an amparo [request for sanctuary] that would cost $1,500 each so that they can move freely through the country and thus be able to reach Ciudad Acuña (Coahuila) to cross to the United States.

According to COMAR , as of November of this year, 17,487 Cubans applied for asylum. Alejandro Austria de la Vega, in charge of the delegation in Chiapas, expects 2022 to end with a little more than 80,000 applications for migrants, with Cubans being the second most important national group. continue reading

“Tapachula is the central point of asylum requests for people who transit through national territory with the intention of reaching the United States in search of a better quality of life for their families, who stayed in their countries of origin,” he told 14ymedio.

The influx of migrants on the southern border of Mexico grew by 40% in the last two weeks compared to the previous year, so the authorities doubled their attention, according to officials of the National Institute of Migration (INM) reported on Wednesday.

According to Migration records, 6,000 multiple immigration forms (FMM) have been granted in the last 15 days; that is, about 400 daily to natives from Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Haiti and Africa. They have placed tents, tables and chairs in the temporary care module to serve about 1,200 migrants a day.

Migration and National Guard agents have avoided setting up camps for migrants to stay to sleep or stand in line from the night before. “We are not going to allow them to set up tents or stay here to sleep,” an official warned the migrants who were going to carry out procedures.

Gráfico de la Comar sobre las solicitudes de asilo recibidas este año. (Comar) — Graph showing requests for asylum this year. (COMAR)

Among those who are waiting for regularization is the Venezuelan Jürgen Casanova, who travels with 15 people. “We are asking for help and sleeping on the streets to avoid spending money on rent for houses or hotels, since all this is hard,” he told EFE.

On a white poster, the South American wrote: “Hello, Mexico. We are a Venezuelan family that needs your help. May God bless you and multiply your support.” Casanova commented that the situation is difficult. “We were victims, we were robbed on the Guatemalan border with Honduras.”

A similar story is told by Ecuadorian Luis Taboada, who travels with his wife and two minors. On a poster, he asks for help to feed his family. “People who have not gone through this journey, who do not try, it is not an easy thing, especially if they go with children. At the beginning I thought that everything would be easy,” he warned.

Even so, he said that he will not give up his trip and will continue despite the shortages and lack of food, since the only option is to meet the final goal of reaching the United States.

The region is experiencing a record migratory flow to the United States, whose Customs and Border Protection Office stopped an unprecedented number of more than 2.76 million undocumented people in fiscal year 2022, a figure that includes substantial increases in Cubans and Venezuelans.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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An Unprecedented DNA Study Confirms and Recovers Indigenous Identity in Cuba

A minority sector of Cuba’s Tainos continued to partially and syncretically transmit their own traditions. (EFE)

14ymedio/EFE, Havana, 16 December 2022 — At 87 years of age, the Cuban Francisco Ramírez Rojas began to cry before they gave him the genetic certificate that said exactly what his grandfather had repeated so many times: that they, despite everything that was said, were descendants of indigenous people.

The document accredits that he, chief of the community of La Ranchería, in Guantánamo, is one of the few living descendants of the Tainos, one of the large groups of pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Island that, according to historian Manuel Moreno Fraginals, “disappeared as a society, drowned biologically and culturally” by the European and African ethnic component.

Despite the story of the “massive extermination” of the indigenous people attributed to the Spanish conquerors — the well-known “black legend” — and although it is true that there were multiple violent encounters on the Island between the two groups during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the vast majority of Cuban Indians mixed in the new villages, died from “undeliberate attacks of pathogens from Europe and Africa, while a minority sector continued to partially and syncretically transmit its own traditions.”

Francisco is not alone. Members of 27 families in 23 communities in eastern Cuba have a proportion of Amerindian indigenous genes that on average doubles the Cuban average, according to an unprecedented study presented this Thursday by a multidisciplinary team in Havana.

The research, five years of fieldwork on the back of decades of previous investigations, adds to ethnographic, historical and even photographic studies, for the first time on a relevant scale, the scientific certainty of DNA tests.

The study “is a milestone,” says the historian of Baracoa, Alejandro Hartmann, one of the promoters of research in these communities. continue reading

The analysis of Francisco, for example, says that 37.5% of his genes are of Amerindian origin, 35.5% European, 15.9% African and 11% Asian. In the country as a whole, by contrast, the Amerindian component on average is 8%, compared to 71% for the European component.

One more detail is that all the DNA tests in this study — 91 people, 74 with conclusive results — refer to female Amerindian ancestors. All male ancestors were European and, to a lesser extent, African.

Specifically, as Cuban geneticist Beatriz Marcheco, from the National Center for Medical Genetics, explains to EFE, from these DNA studies it can be estimated that all these people analyzed descended from “between 900 and 1,000 female” Amerindians who lived in the 16th century.

They survived, hidden in the remote areas that their descendants still inhabit, the “demographic debacle of unimaginable dimensions” that, Marcheco explains, followed the emergence of the Spaniards and Africans in Cuba. There is no trace of male Amerindians.

“It’s not unusual that our own books, even the most recent ones, have discussed for years the total extermination of the Amerindian component of our population. Indeed, we do not have closed communities, but we do have these people who have retained those physical characteristics, who have that footprint on their DNA,” says Marcheco.

DNA studies have been the finishing touch on the project, which emerged five years ago as an initiative to portray descendants of the pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Island.

But as Spanish photographer Héctor Garrido, coordinator of the Cuba Indígena project, explains to EFE, the initiative was evolving towards a “more comprehensive” approach that ended up including historical documentation, portraits, ethnographic studies, anthropological research and, as a cornerstone, genetic analysis.

All these perspectives underline the thesis that the DNA tests confirm. Physical features show the Amerindian component on the faces portrayed, and ethnographic studies collect indigenous traditions such as making cassava (yuca bread cakes), using the “coa” (agricultural tool), growing cimarrón tobacco and celebrating their own religious rites.

The study, according to its authors, has repercussions in multiple areas, starting with the communities investigated — Francis’s tears are proof of this — and ending with Cuba as a whole.

It has also touched them personally, after an intense coexistence with the communities with “big personal implications,” the project director says.

Garrido emphasizes that these families were “fully aware of being descendants of indigenous people” and felt “proud of what they are.” However, he adds, they had mixed feelings when at school they were taught “that the indigenous people were extinct.”

The editor of the meticulous book on the project, the Cuban Julio Larramendi, is convinced that Cuba will welcome these conclusions as “beneficial” and that now is a “good time” to make them known.

“We have this living root, a root that must be fed, watered, given the opportunity to grow and reproduce, to show what traditions have survived, to show that they are part of our culture,” he says.

Marcheco digs deeper into this idea: “All this will allow us a reflection, a new look, a reunion with our roots, a reinterpretation of our origins. And that will have an influence, not only on Cuban thought, but also on the way in which we assume our culture, our diversity, to the extent that we seek a society that includes all of us.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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The Flight of Pitchers Leaves Cuban Baseball with a Broken Wing

Cuban Norge Luis Vera is the only pitcher with more than 30 postseason victories. (Cubadebate)

14ymedio, Havana, 16 December 2022 — The Cuban Norge Luis Vera, considered one of the best National Series pitchers of all time, arrived in the United States this Friday. The gold medalist at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens reunited with his son, Norge Carlos, who currently has possibilities with the Chicago White Sox, journalist Francys Romero revealed on his social networks.

He referred to Vera as “the ace that Santiago of Cuba needed in the times of Antonio Pacheco, Orestes Kindelán and Gabriel Pierre,” for his performance in international events and “classifying among the best in history in victories and effectiveness.”

With Vera’s departure, the Island loses an experienced athlete who also won the silver medal at the Sydney 2000 and Beijing 2008 Olympics, in addition to winning the national championship six times with Santiago de Cuba and being the only pitcher with more than 30 postseason victories. Most importantly, Cuba loses an athlete who was on the way to transmitting his knowledge to new generations.

Vera leaves a difficult void to fill in Cuban baseball, which continues to grow, with the escape of pitchers, so many punches that the panorama paints a resounding defeat. The native of Siboney was ahead of Yoen Socarrás, the 35-year-old from Sancti Spíritus, who was part of the first Elite League. continue reading

Francys Romero told Baseball FR! That just before leaving Socarrás Island he had “asked to leave the sports system,” so he did not rule out that he “will try to settle in the United States and then continue his career on independent circuits or in Mexico. He won’t be short of finding work.”

Sonora was also the departure place of Granma’s former pitcher and pitching coach Ciro Silvino Licea. In mid-September, the baseball player took a flight at Havana’s José Martí International Airport to Nicaragua, from where he embarked on the journey to the United States.

His departure took the Agricultores team by surprise, because he was considered part of the squad of coaches who would intervene in the first Elite League. Licea is a reference among the pitchers in the 23 National Series with 208 games won with 3067.1 innings, where he added 1,887 strikeouts, with an average of 3.69 clean runs, in addition to possessing “a slider difficult to hit and a fast ball over 90 miles an hour with a repertoire that has improved over the years,” as posted on Facebook Sports by Modesto Agüero.

Days earlier, Yanier Fernández Piedra, the former Mayabeque pitching coach, arrived in the United States. “It was a difficult decision to leave Cuba, my family was there, the economic situation was very tough,” he told Periódico Cubano.

Fernández has completed studies in Physical Culture and Sports from the Agricultural University of Havana Fructuoso Rodríguez Pérez, so his foray as a coach of youth teams may be an option.

Translated by Regina Anavy

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With Just 1.5 Percent, ECLAC Halves the Cuban Government’s Growth Forecast

Daily life on the Island continues to experience the onslaught of the Government’s economic mismanagement, which admits that the measures have been “insufficient” to improve GDP. (14ymedio)

EFE/14ymedio, Havana, 15 December 2022 — On Thursday, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) listed Cuba as one of the countries in the region with the worst economic projection for 2023. With only 1.5% growth, the forecast of this United Nations agency is not as optimistic as the Cuban Government’s, which assured that next year the country’s GDP would grow by 3%.

The ECLAC forecast represents, in itself, a decrease in its forecasts for Cuba: its latest report, in October, had placed the increase in the Island’s GDP for 2023 at 1.8%. The regime’s analysts, of course, rejected this number.

Cuba is not the only country whose GDP will decline next year. ECLAC has pointed out that a group of Latin American nations is in a similar situation. The GDPs that will grow the least next year are, according to the organization: El Salvador (1.6%), Colombia (1.5%), Mexico (1.1%), Argentina (1%), Brazil (0.9%), Haiti (-0.7%), and Chile (-1.1%).

ECLAC guaranteed that the economic slowdown in the region will deepen in 2023 and that the growth rate will be 1.3%, 0.1% less than estimated in October. Regional GDP, it estimates, will close this year with an expansion of 3.7%, higher than the 3.6% forecast three months ago but far from the 6.7% recorded in 2021.

According to ECLAC, the slowdown began in the second half of 2022 and reflects both “the exhaustion of the rebound effect on the 2021 recovery” and “the effects of restrictive monetary policies, greater limitations on fiscal spending, lower levels of consumption and investment, and the deterioration of the external context.” continue reading

“The monetary policy responses adopted worldwide, in a context of increased global inflation, have led to increases in financial volatility and risk aversion levels and, therefore, have induced lower capital flows to emerging economies,” the institution said.

In the Preliminary Balance of the Economies of Latin America and the Caribbean 2022 presented this Thursday, ECLAC points out, however, that “the expected reduction in global inflation by 2023 will tend to moderate the increases in the monetary policy rates of the main central banks.”

The report also highlights that the process of recovering labor markets “has not made it possible to eliminate the traditional gaps between men and women,” and that during 2022, ” an increase in unreliability as well as a drop in real wages have been observed.”

In addition, debt levels continue to be high, “so it can be expected that the fiscal space will continue to condition the trajectory of public spending.”

“The risk of rising interest rates, depreciation of currencies and increased sovereign risk would make it difficult to finance governments’ operations by 2023,” the agency added.

To avoid a new lost decade such as that observed during the period 2014-2023, ECLAC calls for “innovative public policies in the productive, financial, commercial, social and care economy.”

Venezuela (12%), Panama (8.4%) and Colombia (8%) will lead economic growth this year, followed by Uruguay (5.4%), the Dominican Republic (5.1%) and Argentina (4.9%), according to the report.

In the middle of the table are the Caribbean islands (4.5%, not counting Guyana, which is experiencing an oil boom), Costa Rica (4.4%), Honduras (4.2%), Guatemala (4%), Nicaragua (3.8%), Bolivia (3.5%), Mexico (2.9%) and Brazil (2.9%).

In the line are Ecuador (2.7%), Peru (2.7%), El Salvador (2.6%), Chile (2.3%), Cuba (2%), Paraguay (-0.3%), and Haiti (-2%), according to the balance sheet.

For 2023, Venezuela continues to lead the projections (5%), followed by the Dominican Republic (4.6%), Panama (4.2%), Paraguay (4%), the Caribbean Islands (3.3%), Guatemala (3.2%), Uruguay (2.9%), Bolivia (2.9%), Honduras (2.7%), Costa Rica (2.6%), Peru (2.2%), Nicaragua (2.1%) and Ecuador (2%).

Translated by Regina Anavy

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An Official Cuban Newspaper Recognizes That it Gets its News From the Independent Press

The report of an official state newspaper doesn’t clarify that its visit takes place more than two weeks after the denunciation in 14ymedio.

14ymedio, Havana, December 15, 2022 — The authorities of Artemisa Province have recognized that they had to destroy more than 82 acres of potatoes in Alquízar, which spoiled due to the lack of irrigation caused by the blackouts of the last months. This is indicated in a report published this Wednesday in El Artemiseño, which, however, attacks 14ymedio, the first newspaper to report on the situation of the potato crop.

As this newspaper revealed on November 28, from the residents of the area themselves, the cuts in electricity required a change in the irrigation cycles, which damaged a large part of the crop in the Cuba-Mexico Friendship Cooperative of Agricultural Production. Specifically, of the planting of 398 acres, divided into four quadrants, three of the potato crops spoiled.

In addition, the locals reported that the rotting potatoes didn’t let them breathe.

For this reporting, el Artemiseño described 14ymedio — a newspaper censured by the regime and to which there is no access from the Island without VPN — as “fake news that flies the flag of serious journalism.”

“In search of the truth, a group from the newspaper [El Artemiseño] went to the area affected, which didn’t smell at all,” says the report of the official newspaper, without clarifying that their visit took place more than two weeks after the report by 14ymedio.

Similarly, El Artemiseño, citing sources of the regime and blaming the United States embargo, criticizes: “Those who call themselves ’speakers of the truth’ omitted in their report the damage caused by the blockade to the agriculture and energy sectors, whose losses amount to more than 270 million and 185 million dollars respectively, just between August 2021 and February 2022.”

The publication acknowledges, however, the destruction of the crop and points out: “We did know that before proceeding with the demolition of the planting, the residents of the area were allowed to enter the field to take advantage of everything possible for animal feed.” And it concedes that in the text of this newspaper “one thing bordered on reality: the energy deficit played a part.” continue reading

Quoting Fernando Ravelo Jaime, president of the cooperative, El Artemiseño said: “Five days after planting, the potato must be lightly watered and then maintain a stability between 200 and 300 cubic meters so that it germinates and does not rot under the earth.” To irrigate one quadrant, with 27 acres, he continues, “you need 18 to 20 hours of stable flow, at 250 cubic meters. That is, it was taking 80 hours to irrigate four quadrants, which was not possible.”

The result was that “only 60% of the potatoes germinated.” Officials told the official newspaper that “only after really knowing the magnitude of the problem did crop protection measures begin to be adopted.”

Now, of 205 acres planted with national seed, the newspaper says, “there are 124 standing.” In the “damaged area, high-yield corn was planted that should provide about 74 tons per acre,” which, it explains, “allows taking advantage of the fertilized soil to harvest the tender grain in the same period that the potatoes would have needed to sprout.”

El Artemiseño points out that the director of the Electric Company has assured it that this type of incident will not be repeated, because “today the situation in the country is different, due to the increase in the maintenance of thermoelectric power plants and the diesel and fuel generators, which allow between 21 and 22 hours a day of electricity in the province.” With this guarantee, the local newspaper prophesies that “Alquízar will not stop sowing the 420 acres it has planned for the campaign. The seed is in the municipality and the sowing is ready in another machine.”

Translated by Regina Anavy

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