Until now, Canada was one of the largest contributors to the island’s economy through tourism and nickel mining, both of which have been paralyzed by the energy crisis.
The Canadian government announced Monday that it is working on an aid package for Cuba in response to prolonged power outages and severe fuel shortages exacerbated by the U.S. oil embargo. “We are preparing an assistance plan. At this time, we cannot provide details of the announcement,” said Foreign Minister Anita Anand, according to a report by the Associated Press.
Although the official did not specify the form of the aid, the shipment could repeat what Mexico did in early February, when it sent two Navy ships to Havana with 814 tons of basic supplies such as milk, beans, rice, oil and tuna, in addition to the shipment of another 1,500 tons of powdered milk and beans.
As the leading source of tourists to the island and the main foreign investor in the mining and gas industries through the Sherritt Corporation, Canada has contributed to sustaining the Cuban economy for decades. The energy crisis triggered by the loss of oil donated by its Venezuelan ally after the military operation to capture then-President Nicolás Maduro on January 3rd has paralyzed two of the Cuban regime’s main sources of foreign currency: tourism and mining.
“We are preparing an assistance plan. At this time we cannot provide details of the announcement.”
In just a few weeks, Canadian airlines canceled all their flights to Cuba due to a critical fuel shortage. These included Air Canada, which operated 16 weekly flights, as well as WestJet, Air Transat, and Sunwing.
Furthermore, the Canadian government issued a travel alert to its citizens on its official website in early February, noting that the current situation on the island is “unpredictable and could deteriorate, disrupting flight availability at a short time.” It also warned that “a high degree of caution should be exercised in Cuba due to worsening shortages of electricity, fuel, and basic necessities, including food, water, and medicine, which may also affect tourist resorts.”
The crisis, however, began long before Maduro’s fall, and Canadian tourism figures have dropped to almost half of what they were in 2015, when 1.3 million visitors arrived, fleeing the harsh winter in the northern country. In 2025, only 754,010 arrived, although the numbers improved slightly in January 2026 compared to the same month the previous year.
Last week, the mining giant Sherritt announced the suspension of its operations at the nickel and cobalt mines it operates in Moa (Holguín) due to a fuel shortage. The corporation stated that it plans to pause operations and put the processing plant on standby, during which time it will carry out “planned maintenance activities.”
The decision was made, the firm explained, after receiving “a notification that planned fuel deliveries to Moa will not be fulfilled and the timeframe for the resumption of deliveries is unknown.”
For American businessman William Pitt , whose family had multiple mining properties expropriated by the regime in 1960, the decision also jeopardizes the production of natural gas that supplies Havana, since the Cuban government was paying Sherritt with cobalt to repay its $250 million debt, and while production is stopped, it will no longer be able to do so.
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