After 60 years of communism it's hard to know
just how many Cubans
still support the revolutionary ideals
of Fidel Castro.
There are no free elections or
independent polls, the state controls the
media
and shuts down the internet when it
wants. All we know
is what we're seeing and hearing. And in
July when thousands of Cubans marched in
protest
they were chatting things like ...
And also this:
The chant is from this song released a
few months ago —
a song that's become the soundtrack to
people's frustrations.
It's a spin on Fidel Castro's famous
slogan.
The system right now
isn't working for anyone. So let's get
into some of the main reasons why,
starting with the absolute essential —
getting enough to eat.
In most countries
food is supplied by a mix of public and
private industries.
But Cuba's communist system centralises
and controls that whole process.
Farming is already tough enough. There
are shortages of things like pesticides,
fuel and equipment — stuff that has to be
imported.
And there's a drought — the worst in a
hundred years.
Now, the government sets prices and
production quotas for farmers.
It collects their produce and controls
distribution.
But most economists agree that that
kills any incentive for farmers to be
more productive
and the whole system is bureaucratic and
inefficient.
It didn't work in the Soviet Union, it's
not working in Cuba.
What all this
means is that Cuba can't feed itself.
The state has to import something like
70% of food
and that just got even more expensive in
the last year. Global prices jumped
40% because of the pandemic. Now
to buy food on the international market
Cuba needs foreign currency but it
doesn't have much of that
and there's a whole bunch of reasons for
it — mismanagement by the country's
leaders,
for sure, but also the US embargo,
which those same leaders have
consistently blamed for the terrible
state of the economy.
A full trade embargo was
first imposed by President Kennedy
after Fidel Castro seized power in the
Cuban revolution.
It's basically a web of laws and
regulations that banned US companies
from trading with anyone linked to the
Cuban state.
The sanctions also make it complicated
for international companies to do
business with Cuba,
especially because so much global trade
is done in US dollars
so it has to go through banks in the US.
Cuba still has trade worth hundreds of
millions of dollars with other countries
like China, Spain and Germany, but the US
embargo makes it all more time consuming
and more expensive. And because nearly
everything in Cuba is owned and
controlled by the state or the military
the sanctions don't just hurt Cuba's
leaders, they affect the whole economy.
Under President Obama a lot of sanctions
were relaxed.
He even took Cuba off the US list of
state sponsors of terrorism.
But his successor, President Trump,
reversed that policy,
put Cuba back on the terror list and
added about 200 more sanctions
that target government ministries and
businesses linked to the military.
So far President Biden has kept all
those sanctions and even added some more
against Cuban officials
after the crackdown on protesters in
July. What's clear is that Cuba's ability
to provide for its people,
which let's face it, is supposed to be
the Cuban model,
well, that's being squeezed like never
before. And gone
are Cuba's rich friends.
For decades it could count on the Soviet
Union but when it collapsed in the 1990s
so did Cuba's economy. That was Cuba's
last big crisis.
In the 2000s Cuba found a new friend in
Venezuela
and benefitted from dirt cheap Venezuelan
oil to use
and resell. But oil shipments
are way down because of US sanctions
and the collapse of Venezuela's economy
and its oil sector. And it's left Cuba
struggling to keep the lights on.
Because the economy has been so
bad for years
many Cubans have relied on remittances,
money sent from their relatives abroad,
especially those in the US
And that's an important source of
dollars for the Cuban economy too.
But even that tap isn't flowing like it
used to.
Under President Trump companies like
Western Union were banned from sending
cash
because they work with a bank in Cuba
owned by the military.
So that dried up a big source of cash.
And Cubans can hardly rely on their own
currency.
The peso just can't buy them what they
need. It got even worse
when the government devalued the peso
back in January as part of a major
currency reform.
It's a huge mess. And then
you add a pandemic
which has cut off another economic
lifeline for Cuba —
tourist dollars.
This year international visitors are
down by nearly 90%.
The other devastating effect of the
pandemic has been on Cuba's health
system.
It's often held up as an example of
something Cuba's actually done
quite well, at least better than some of
its Latin American neighbours.
But like other sectors it suffered from
mismanagement
and sanctions — and now it's being crushed
by COVID-19.
And all those pressures, well, they seem
to have pushed Cubans to speak out
against their government
more openly than ever before. But it's
all come at a cost.
One organisation has recorded at least
700 detentions and forced disappearances
since those July 11 protests.
The question is: How much
longer are Cubans
prepared to wait?