Another Harvest Below Expectations

Cuba: Another Harvest Below Expectations

July 1, 2014

Vicente Morin Aguado



HAVANA TIMES — Today, Cuba produces as much sugar as it did a century

ago, when Mario Garcia Menocal, nicknamed "the foreman of Chaparra" (a

well-known factory he owned in the province of Las Tunas), was president

of the country. This year's harvest officially reported a little over

1.6 million tons of sugar, 12% below the planned amount.



According to Liobel Perez, spokesman for Cuba's sugar production company

Azcuba, only six of the country's provinces fulfilled the production

plan established for the 49 refineries in operation. Historical records

show that, when the revolution triumphed, more than 150 sugar refineries

(easily capable of producing over 6 million tons of this natural

sweetener) were in operation.



The agricultural yield reported – a figure that has particular

significance for Cuba – was of 43 tons of sugarcane per hectare. This

was hailed as a feat of Cuban agricultural workers, when the acceptable

average is over 60 tons anywhere in the world.



That said, officials at Azcuba can look back to even more disastrous

figures, lower than 30 tons of sugar raw material for every hundred

square meters of land (the 2010-2011 harvest average), a yield that is

unsustainable if one wishes to make a minimum profit.



Though a little more was produced in comparison to the previous harvest,

this is the second year in a row in which the country fails to meet the

production plan. In the 2012-2013 period, production came in 11 % below

the plan. The slight improvement this year is no success: it

demonstrates the inability of the industry – once the pride of the Cuban

nation – to recover its efficiency.



There is no shortage of the typical excuses that accompany the

declarations made by the high officials responsible. This time, they

again lay the blame on the hot and humid weather which hinders the

conversion of the sucrose contained in the sugarcane. The previous year,

a hurricane named Sandy was the culprit (the culprit one cannot capture

and make accountable).



A little over a decade ago, Cuba's top leadership made the hasty

decision of turning half of the country's sugar refineries into scrap

metal, in view of the industry's patent inability to accomplish

agricultural yields that were internationally competitive (and of the

low market price of sugar at the time).



The situation changed, beyond the control of those who manage Cuba's

economy through improvised measures. The price of food products,

particularly sugar and one of its essential derivatives, ethanol, is

growing steadily. Cuba's leaders now want to rectify the situation, but

are unable to maintain a productive pace that can bring in the profits

that the country's agroindustry (an industry that once turned Cuba into

the world's top sugar producer) deserves.



Source: "Cuba: Another Harvest Below Expectations - Havana Times.org" -

http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=104592