New Zealand Butter
The chicken comes from Canada, the label on the salt says it comes from Chile, the “tropical marinade” is “Made in the USA” and the sugar is from Brazil. The milk has a Dutch cow on the tetra pack, the lemon juice was processed in Mexico and the hamburger meat advertises in large letters that it is “one hundred percent Argentine beef.” The cheese package says that it’s Gouda from Germany, and the cookies have some Chinese characters explaining their origin, while the rice was cultivated in the paddies of Vietnam. We are drowning in the foreign!
So I asked an economist friend why the butter from the kiosk in our neighborhood is from New Zealand. Is it because we can’t produce such a basic food? And, I demanded, isn’t there some place closer we could get it from? The young woman, a graduate from the University of Havana, responded with the same phrase as the title of one of our comedy shows, “Let me tell you…” Then she told me that after finishing her studies they assigned her to complete her Social Service in an agency of the Ministry of the Food Industry. There, the fat freight invoices paid to transport goods from distant countries came to her attention. She took a list of some of them to the director, among which was one for powdered milk bought from some distant place in Oceania. The man cleared his throat and told her, “Don’t get mixed up in this because it’s rumored that the factory over there is owned by a Cuban higher-up…”
It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that individuals well-placed in the framework of power of this country own industries abroad under cover names. Equally unacceptable would be privileging the importing of products from these companies over ones that are closer and cheaper. That is, that so much money from the national coffers would end up in the pockets of a few — also nationals — who are the same people who decide where to buy from. Like a skilled magician passes a wad of bills, without our being able to see it, from his left hand to his right hand. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why certain brands — really bad and exorbitantly priced — monopolize the shelves in our stores. The old trick of “buying from yourself” would cause the country to incur excessive charges and crowd out domestic products of higher quality and lower cost.
I know, reader, that all this seems to be the fruit of great paranoia on the part of my friend… and on mine as well; but I hope that one day we’ll know, we’ll know everything.
Enero 20th, 2013 at 18:04
Hey , at least your country isnt on verge of bankruptsy because the pres./fam.spend money like water and he’s borrowed so much from freakin’ china that our grandchildren will never pay it back.Which is worse, a murdering dictatorship that keeps the thumb screws on you or a “bought” president who is economically putting the screws on us to turn us into a country of welfare addicts ?
Enero 10th, 2013 at 07:20
[...] Cuban dissident blogger Yoani Sanchez, in a post entitled New Zealand Butter, asks why her country is importing such basic products from so far away: http://www.desdecuba.com/generationy/?p=3270 [...]
Enero 6th, 2013 at 23:08
To the nazist gulag usa and their propaganda machines (foxtv, cnn and whatnot):
You are going down the path of destruction you have imposed on the world for far too long. Now is the time for you to take your own medicine and die in horrible suffering, much like the suffering and the horrors of death and destruction you so generusly spread around the world under the shi**y excuse of “spreading democracy”.
Well, guess what. No one gives a shift any more about you. No one reads this stupid site you have created in your delusional and fanatical pursue of your profits from exploiting other people. You are a history and your efforts in promoting your internal traitors as some sort of “democracy and free speech” champions is old and worn out tactic that just doesn’t work any more.
NOTHING will work for you any more. You are nothing but a bunch of murderous maniacs that should be dealt with by your own “democracy” laws - death penalty.
Nothing else is good enough for you.
Enero 6th, 2013 at 22:54
The thing is, “friendly translator”, that there actually a lot of people who do. NAd much more that the 1 and a half of you that don’t.
The fact is that the “popularity” of the team “yoani” has dwindled of late and it is in a sharp freefall. So, the world that does not read your website and the lies you are trying to peddle here, doesn’t really care about you and your petty little hate and lies.
“Anónimo
Enero 2nd, 2013 at 17:47
The thing is Damir, no body cares what you think.”
According to the alexa.com, this site has fallen sharply from its’ peak ranking of 52,197, back in 2010. Today it’s trafic ranking peaks at 87,779 but for the most of the time it sits as low as 106,254. The only reason it still has any ranking is because its’ most faithful audience are males over 65, and from usa.
The rest of the world doesn’t visit it any more, except occasionally. Outside of a few Spanish-speaking countries and the usa, the site is practically unknown.
So, no one in the world really cares what some domestic traitor and wannabe Castro after Castros thinks.
Dig that “friendly translator” anonimo? I really couldn’t care less what do you and your bum licker from Cuba think. Your usa is disintegrating unstoppably. Your “some kind of pragmatic capitalism” had ceased to exist in 2008 when the usanian nazist government had to do the purely socialist thing and save the industry and economy in a free fall.
Mind you, it did not work and it will not work because of two insurmontable obstacles:
16 trillion internal debt of the government, and growing;
and
56 trillion total debt, and growing.
There’s simply NO WAY on earth to repay the total debt because it has entered into the loop and it is self-feeding.
And that is the essence of capitalism. at work. The core principle of capitalism leads to this self-feeding loop.
Only socialism has the answer, and that is what they tried to do in the usa nazist gulag, but being capitalists (read stupid), they did not and still don’t understand that it was done way too late.
Now the only way out is total destruction of capitalism.
Self-destruction that is.
Of course.
Enero 6th, 2013 at 22:24
I have provided a number of links that prove the copy and paste “genius” to be a delusional liar who is one of the two people in the world that still believe that there is no embargo and economic blockade on Cuba by the nazist usanian gulag.
It is voted down every year in UN Assembly and the only two countries voting against removing it are israel and usa, the two centres of all evil today in the world.
The problem with the copy and paste “genius”, who is using someone else’s web site to promote him/herself (as those delusional capitalists always do) is that s/he is so deeply entrenched in her/his failed ideology that there simply isn’t a way to break that mental block in that empty geriatric head.
Some of the previous anti-Cuban posters here have already died off. It is only a matter of time for this lone self-promoting hater to follow the suit and disappear into the oblivion.
Don’t let us wait for much longer. You have got nothing to say anyway. The amount of other people’s articles and thoughts you have posted here with
ZERO of your own input, shows nicely how little you are capable of offering.
“Nothing” sums it up perfectly.
Enero 6th, 2013 at 18:57
Jack Spitz!! YOU SEEM TO “SPITZ” OUT A LOT OF HATE! PUN INTENDED! BUT THERE IS REALLY NO “BLOCKAGE” OR “EMBARGO” DEAR! IF YOU CAN PROVIDE PROOF WITH LINK ON HOW THIS “BLOCKAGE” OR “EMBARGO” IS HURTING THE ORDINARY CUBAN PEOPLE PLEASE DO SO! I KEEP ASKING FOR THIS INFORMATION BUT NO ONE HAS THE GUTS TO POST IT! OR DOES IT EVEN EXIST?
U.S.-CUBA TRADE AND ECONOMIC COUNCIL, INC.
ECONOMIC EYE ON CUBA- February 2012 - Report For Calendar Year 2011
2011-2001 U.S. EXPORT STATISTICS FOR CUBA
The following is the data for exports from the United States to the Republic of Cuba relating to the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act (TSRA) of 2000, which re-authorized the direct commercial (on a cash basis) export of food products (including branded food products) and agricultural products (commodities) from the United States to the Republic of Cuba, irrespective of purpose. The TSRA does not include healthcare products, which remain authorized by the Cuban Democracy Act (CDA) of 1992.
The data represents the U.S. Dollar value of product exported from the United States to the Republic of Cuba under the auspice of TSRA. The data does not include transportation charges, bank charges, or other costs associated with exports from the United States to the Republic of Cuba. The government of the Republic of Cuba reports data that, according to the government of the Republic of Cuba, includes transportation charges, bank charges, and other costs. However, the government of the Republic of Cuba has not provided verifiable data. The use of trade data reported by the government of the Republic of Cuba is suspect. The government of the Republic of Cuba has been asked to provide verifiable data, but has not.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE REPORT!
http://www.cubatrade.org/CubaExportStats.pdf
Enero 6th, 2013 at 18:51
Dr. Wayne MacArthur said: “We have worked closely with Cuban authorities and farmers over many decades, to help establish a local dairy industry in Cuba, through the free transfer of technology and expertise, and will always continue to do so.”
HEY DOC! CAN YOU PROVIDE A LINK TO YOU AND YOUR INDUSTRY! I CANT SEEM TO FIND YOU ONLINE DEAR! GRACIAS HERMANO NUEVO ZEALANDER!
Enero 5th, 2013 at 21:23
I am a New Zealander living in New Zealand, so I was intrigued by the title of your article. I have visited Cuba at least 20 - 30 times on business over the last 20 years, and each time has been a great pleasure. I love Cuba and the Cubans I have met over the years, but I take no position on politics as it is not my right to comment publically on the affairs of others. I do appreciate and sympathize with Cubans and the hardships they face, and I disagree with the economic blockade forced upon Cuba by the U.S.
However I am writing about your article. We are ourselves are a socialist country and New Zealand has been supplying dairy products to Cuba since the Revolution. We can be considered the the most efficient producer of dairy products in the world, and therefore our prices are the lowest when you compare the high quality. Exports of milk, butter, cheese, etc., is closely controlled by our government, and nobody apart from the New Zealand farmer’s co-operative, are permitted to own any part of the export company [Fonterra]. Therefore it is impossible for any Cuban [or anyone else around the world] to own, or part own the factories that produce and export butter.
We have worked closely with Cuban authorities and farmers over many decades, to help establish a local dairy industry in Cuba, through the free transfer of technology and expertise, and will always continue to do so.
You comment on the “supposed high freight”, but it is not so in reality. We export to almost all of Latin America and the US. The products that go to Cuba, probably come from our export shipments to Mexico, and they pay the bulk of the freight costs, with Cuba only paying for the freight from Mexico to Cuba, which is very close.
Thank you for allowing me to correct some errors, as in my experience the relationship between Cubans and New Zealanders is very strong.
Enero 5th, 2013 at 01:32
The piece about butter is typical of the type of “journalism” Yoani does.She tries to build a case about corruption based on a remark supposedly made t a young woman about not asking too many questions; from this, Yoani builds her case for corruption. How absurd. She would not even come up to the non-standards of Fox lies in the U.S. We do not need to wait to know what she is: a sniveling lackey of the U.S. government. She was bought and paid for a long time ago, and it is evident in her trashy articles. She seems not to know that there is a blockade of Cuban products by the U.S. or if she knows, she is too much of a prostitute to mention it. It is rather silly to talk about foreing products in Cuba and not mention that this is the way of the world; if she were not so stupid, she would tweet less and read something to get a smattering of education. She is one of the dumbest people on earth. She is a useful idiot for the U.S. and the Cuban government uses her to determine what the latest propaganda of the U.S. is about. His idiot Humberto Capiro writes most of the comments in defense of the idiot Yoani. Salim Lamrani long ago showed Yoani up as a stupid, know nothing fascist, and everything she says demonstrates the truth of his assessment.
Enero 3rd, 2013 at 07:43
[...] Its good that the Cuban-American community remains in steadfast opposition to the regime on the island. If not them, who? For people in these neck of the woods, Washington, DC, they tend not think much of these things. In fact, most folks would rather be sipping mojitos in Cuba than a coffee in Miami. Too bad. [...]
Enero 2nd, 2013 at 21:17
BROOKINGS INSTITUTE: The New Cuban Economy: What Roles for Foreign Investment? - By: Richard Feinberg
For revolutionary Cuba, foreign investment has been about more than dollars and cents. It’s about cultural identity and national sovereignty. It’s also about a model of socialist planning, a hybrid of Marxist-Leninism and Fidelismo, which has jealously guarded its domination over all aspects of the economy. During its five decades of rule, the regime’s political and social goals always dominated economic policy; security of the revolution trumped productivity.
THE WORLD’S HEAVIEST TAX ON LABOR
The most unusual characteristic of the Cuban FDI regime is the labor contract system . FDI firms are not generally allowed to directly hire labor . Rather, a state employment agency—typically a dependency of the relevant sectoral ministry (e .g ., tourism, light industry)—hires, fires, settles labor disputes, establishes wage scales, and pays the wages directly to the workers . The FDI pays the wage bill to the state employment agency which in turn pays the workers . But there is a very special twist to the Cuban system: the FDI pays wages to the employment agency in hard currency and the employment agency turns around and compensates the workers in local currency, an effective devaluation or tax of 24-to-1 . Thus, if the firm pays the employment agency $500 a month and the employment agency pays the workers 500 pesos, over 90 percent of the wage payment disappears in the currency conversion; the effective compensation is instantly deflated to $21 per month . This could be the world’s heaviest labor tax . It provoked one Cuban worker to remark to the author: “In Cuba, it’s a great myth that we live off the state . In fact, it’s the state that lives off of us .”
This labor system, which also authorizes only one national union (the Confederation of Cuban Workers, which is closely allied with the Communist Party), violates many principles of the International Labor Organization, of which Cuba is a charter member . It also freezes Cuba into a low-wage, low-productivity trap .
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE REPORT!
http://www.brookings.edu/resea.....y-feinberg
Enero 2nd, 2013 at 21:15
YOUTUBE: DOCUMENTARY “Under Cuban Skies” — Workers and Their RIghts - Under Cuban Skies Workers and Their Rights is an account of the systematic violation of human and labor rights committed by Fidel and Raul Castro since they took power fifty years ago, supposedly on behalf of the Cuban worker. Their revolutionary government, as the film shows, is the only hiring entity and, as such, is guilty of discrimination in employment, of confiscating 97% of the salaries paid by foreign investors, and of prohibiting the workers right to organize representative unions, or to conduct collective bargaining. Interviews with hotel workers the privileged class of the Cuban labor force and with independent labor leaders and dissident journalists, were conducted in Cuba, while counterpart interviews were filmed in Spain, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and Miami. The two sets of interviews make clear the stark contrast between the labor conditions in hotels operated by multinational corporations in Cuba and hotels run by those same corporations abroad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJMU90nq-Bs
Enero 2nd, 2013 at 17:47
The thing is Damir, no body cares what you think.
Enero 2nd, 2013 at 08:53
Good question Marco. If the Chinese had higher wages and unions Apple would have to build their Ipods elsewhere.
Hopefully worker rights will come to all countries one day.
The big question in Cuba is not the NZ Butter, it’s the “tropical marmalade” from the USA and the sugar from Brazil.
Cuban workers make much less than American workers, the Chinese or other Latin American workers and are capable of growing tropical fruit and sugar.
The answer is as Yoani suggests, the complete corruption of the socialist system and its inability to produce anything efficiently.
As Cuba moves towards a one-party capitalist dictatorship it will start attracting more manufacturing just as China did.
Enero 2nd, 2013 at 06:45
Anonimo/”friendly translator”, you are deleting again my posts, are you “democracy and free speech chimp”.
Well, here it is again. The personal information about the team “yoani’s” Spanish residence and confirmation that they are just a part of greater imperialist machine working against CUBA:
Yoani Sanchez
Sta.Ma- Soledad Torres Acosta 2
28004
Madrid
ES
+34 918298497
And it is also very funny to note that the team “yoani’s” address is in Spain while the domain registrar is in
GERMANY
Hostmaster Strato Rechenzentrum
Tech-C Address: Cronon AG Professional IT-Services
Tech-C Address: Emmy-Noether-Str. 10
Tech-C Postal Code: 76131
Tech-C City: Karlsruhe
Tech-C Country: DE
Tech-C Phone: +49 72166320305
Tech-C Fax: +49 72166320303
If yo live in Spain, why on earth would you want to register your domain in another country? And in Germany at that, which is much more expensive than Spain!!!!????
Because your cia handlers organised everything for you in Germany, didn’t they?
While you were “studying” the “art of blogging”!!!
HAHAHA!!!!
Who are you kidding!!!?? You have got no idea about Wordpress and computers. You haven’t written a single letter in any of your books, and neither on this site.
There are many of your verbal comments on the internet and any good philolog can tell us that the person that speaks is
NOT
the person that writes here.
Apart from the fact that teh spanish language of the writer and teh speaker are two different languages, it is also very obvious from your videos that the poor woman is just not a skillful speaker at all, let alone a skillful writer.
And look at some of the posts here in spanish! Sometimes the language varies from a peasant’s lingo to a moderately educated person.
But, the only consistent thing is that the Spanish used is
N O T
CUBAN Spanish.
The woman in your videos speaks like a proper Cuban. There’s no sofistication in her. And there are many typically Cuban phrases used in her speech.
Yet there are none of these in Spanish language of the posts here.
See, my wife is a linguist, and she specialises in Latin languages. She has discovered this anomaly and she is of opinion that this puppet is indeed not the author of the posts here.
The verbal language just doesn’t come close to even that moderately educated Spanish your cia handlers use in their banal and deranged propaganda rants.
A farce, that you most certainly are.
Enero 1st, 2013 at 22:11
Nice entry. Drowning in the foreign is a great way to put this. Unfortunately its too common in all of Latin America, although in countries other than Cuba its more like drowning in the American. I live in the USA and even here everything is made in China these days. Not because our economy is so bad, but because they can make it all less expensive using cheap overworked labor. Its funny that New Zealand butter was the focus. I lived in Cuba for a short while and was surprised to see it virtually everywhere and wondered the same. So who knows what the explanation is for the far travelling butter. But I also ask myself, “is an ipod travelling 8,000 miles from Beijing to New York the most efficient way to do this?” Maybe not.
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 21:55
Damir had nothing to do at Xmas and nothing happening new years eve. Sad.
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 21:00
Apparently the mentally deranged and unstable do not recognize themselves on this forum, while posting pointless rants. Happy New Year to all.
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 20:09
I am left to wonder what is this butter from N. Zealand in the life of a “dissident” like the team “yoani’s” domestic traitors. Probably something along the “Last tango in Paris” lines…
In the meantime, and in a stark contrast with the team “yoani’s” lies about women in Cuba being opressed and maltreated (by communists and communism, and just about everything else under the Cuban sun that annoys the criminals and domestic traitors), the reality is quite different:
In the current National Assembly sit 266 women, which is 43,32 % of the total number of its members.
For the next elections 299 women are putting forward their candidatures. If all of them are elected, that would lift the total number of wome in the National Assembly to 48,86 %.
Which other national assembly/parliament in the world has that many women representing the people of the country?
Surely the nazist gulag usa, boasting to be the “democratic” country…???
Not really.
Out of 100 senators in the nazist senate, only 17 are currently women, constituting 17%.
And in congress there are 76 women, constituting 16.6% of all representatives.
And the nazist call that a “revolution” and an “empowerment” of women!!!
Cuba beat the shift out of them by having almost a half of its’ National Asembly representatives seats filled by women.
Yeah, let us talk about women being a second grade citizens in Cuba.
Ok, I can understand that a domestic traitor is dealt with according to the law and prohibited from being a politician, it is a normal practice in every country in the world. There’s no place in politics for criminals and mentally deranged and unstable individuals.
The joke is on those cre^%s in cia for financing this loser, self-declared liar and disturbed person in dire need of professional help.
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 19:43
General elections in Cuba. The photos and biographies of the candidates are being widely published for all Cubans to see. None of them from the “dissidents”, Marx forbid from the team “yoani’s” doemstic traitors and terrorists.
Ho come? They say they want the change, yet they do not want to participate in the process.
If yo do not participate, you cannot influence the change.
The team “yoani” are in this only for the money, and maybe for the “throne” when their idols Castros leave it up for grabs.
http://www.vanguardia.co.cu/in.....j_id=26941
Hypocrites.
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 18:45
HAVANA TIMES: Punishing Cuba’s Rosa Maria Paya - Haroldo Dilla Alfonso
The recent immigration reforms enacted by the Cuban government after a year-long push were greeted with joy by intellectuals, foreign governments and international organizations.
Although the executive order has not yet come into force, I invite those doing the cheering to take a moment and pay attention to the case of Rosa Maria Paya.
She is the daughter of Oswaldo Paya, the recently deceased leader of the Christian Liberation Movement. This is a young woman who has not reached her first quarter-century. A recent university graduate with a bachelor’s degree in physics; she was invited by Chile’s Miguel de Cervantes University to pursue a degree in public policy. She was denied permission to leave the country and she was not even informed of the reason for the refusal.
Noting the articles summarizing the official reasons for deciding who can and cannot travel, one cannot determine in which category Rosa Paya fits.
Discounting technical reasons — though she’s a college graduate, the University of Havana rejected her as a teacher alleging procedural matters — I can’t imagine that this young woman could be placed in the sinister categories of being a threat to the “public interest,” “the foundations of the Cuban State” or “national security.”
In short, Paya is a young woman whose brief path in life has not allowed her to become a leader within the asphyxiating spaces of the opposition. She wasn’t invited to a hostile country or by an organization of the militant opposition; instead, she was invited by a recognized university that is linked to a political current that, while in no way sympathetic to the Cuban regime, is opposed to the blockade/embargo and to violence.
From the official Cuban point of view, Rosa Maria is punishable because she has adopted a position that is politically belligerent with regard to the government, which is completely her right, and because apparently she is attempting to assume the leadership dramatically abandoned by her father, which, needless to note, is also her right.
The Cuban government — hard and as brittle as the ice in which it keeps Cuban society embedded — is pathologically afraid of such civic challenges.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE!
http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=85187
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 18:37
SALON: The way we left Cuba - I came to Havana to film a documentary about a local boxer — and found a country trapped in an Orwellian nightmare - By Brin-Jonathan Butler
The plane began its descent over the last 90 haunting miles of sea that divides Cuba from the United States, a sea that might be the largest graveyard in the world. Out my window the sunset glazed over the surface of the ocean and glinted off the slits and nicks of wave-creases like fresh wounds. Up and down the plane I heard the slap of blinders yanked down over the windows while the rest of us eagerly took in the view. It’s this last homestretch that always fleshes out the tourists from the locals on flights to the island.
There are plenty of tragic and inspiring choices, but the most obvious legacy Castro will leave behind is the broken family.
As the plane touched down at Jose Marti Airport I still wasn’t sure I would be allowed to enter Cuba in the first place. I had spent my last trip a few months earlier conducting illegal interviews with the country’s most famous boxing champions, men who had turned down millions and were only willing to discuss it if I paid them under the table. Of course there was no official way to have these interviews given the sensitivity of the topic. The state security had started following me after the first interview. All the Cubans I was working with couldn’t understand why we weren’t being arrested. But we kept going until we landed every interview on my wish list. Then it was just a matter of getting that material out.
While I probably should have quit while I was ahead, my purpose this time around was to knock on the door of one of the most politically radioactive residences in the country—the wife of Guillermo Rigondeux, a 30-year-old two-time Olympic boxing champion, branded by Fidel Castro as a Judas and traitor to the Cuban people. I was there to track down the family of one of the most notorious defectors in Cuban history.
Since Rigondeaux had escaped on a smuggler’s boat (venture humanitarianism between Cuba and Cancun has thrived enormously the last few years) and become a permanent exile, his family had been living under 24-hour surveillance and nearly house arrest. Cuban state security doesn’t mess around. As attractive an analogy it might be for any foreigner to view Rigondeaux as a kind of Orpheus, a highly charged defector forever abandoning his life, nobody is in any hurry to have a camera and a microphone placed in the face of Eurydice to discuss the matter. The official state version of events is quite sufficient, muchas gracias. Bienvenido a Cuba!
Everyone on the island knows that at Castro’s first trial, when he was asked to confess who was intellectually responsible for his attack against Batista, he proclaimed it was none other than “a poet.” But whether Cuba’s Comandante likes it or not, his country is poetry of a different order, something like 1984 penned by Charles Dickens.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE!
http://www.salon.com/2012/12/3…..left_cuba/
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 18:11
THANKS Griffn!! LETS HOPE THAT NEXT YEAR WE WILL ALL PUT OUR REAL NAMES WITH NO FEAR (Cuban guilt) OF REPERCUSSIONS!
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 17:55
Humberto,
I want to wish you a very Happy New Year! Thank you for all the posts chock-full-of-links on everything Cuba.
And may 2013 be a very Happy New Year for the people of Cuba. Viva Cuba Libre!
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 16:22
ANOTHER AWESOME DOCUMENTARY TRAILER: “Split Decision: The Guillermo Rigondeaux Story” - Guillermo Rigondeaux Ortiz (born September 30, 1980 in Santiago de Cuba) is a Cuban boxer who won the gold medal at the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics in the Bantamweight (54 kg) class. Rigondeaux is a seven-time (2000–06) Cuban national champion at bantamweight. He currently claims an amateur record of nearly 400 fights with twelve losses; with his last losses coming to Rencise Perez and Bekzat Sattarkhanov in 1998, Waldemar Font in 1999, and his most recent loss against Aghasi Mammadov in 2003. After his defection in 2009, he turned professional. He is the current WBA Super Bantamweight Champion. Guillermo Rigondeaux is widely considered to be one of the greatest amateur fighters of all time.[3] According to Freddie Roach, Rigondeaux is probably the greatest talent he has ever seen.[4] Filmmaker Brin-Jonathan Butler is making a documentary about Rigondeaux.[5]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZm4gFzRPGo
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 15:39
YOUTUBE CUBAN DOCUMENTARY TRAILER: “Split Decision: The Guillermo Rigondeaux Story” - Guillermo Rigondeaux Ortiz (Spanish pronunciation: [?i??ermo ri?on?do]; born September 30, 1980 in Santiago de Cuba) is a Cuban boxer who won the gold medal at the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics in the Bantamweight (54 kg) class. Rigondeaux is a seven-time (2000–06) Cuban national champion at bantamweight. He currently claims an amateur record of nearly 400 fights with twelve losses; with his last losses coming to Rencise Perez and Bekzat Sattarkhanov in 1998, Waldemar Font in 1999, and his most recent loss against Aghasi Mammadov in 2003. After his defection in 2009, he turned professional. He is the current WBA Super Bantamweight Champion. Guillermo Rigondeaux is widely considered to be one of the greatest amateur fighters of all time.[3] According to Freddie Roach, Rigondeaux is probably the greatest talent he has ever seen.[4] Filmmaker Brin-Jonathan Butler is making a documentary about Rigondeaux.[5]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0ZVbgDG67Q
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 15:01
FOR ALL YOU SPORTS, BOXING FANS AND CUBAPHILES! AN EXCELLENT READ!
SALON: The way we left Cuba - I came to Havana to film a documentary about a local boxer — and found a country trapped in an Orwellian nightmare - By Brin-Jonathan Butler
The plane began its descent over the last 90 haunting miles of sea that divides Cuba from the United States, a sea that might be the largest graveyard in the world. Out my window the sunset glazed over the surface of the ocean and glinted off the slits and nicks of wave-creases like fresh wounds. Up and down the plane I heard the slap of blinders yanked down over the windows while the rest of us eagerly took in the view. It’s this last homestretch that always fleshes out the tourists from the locals on flights to the island.
There are plenty of tragic and inspiring choices, but the most obvious legacy Castro will leave behind is the broken family.
As the plane touched down at Jose Marti Airport I still wasn’t sure I would be allowed to enter Cuba in the first place. I had spent my last trip a few months earlier conducting illegal interviews with the country’s most famous boxing champions, men who had turned down millions and were only willing to discuss it if I paid them under the table. Of course there was no official way to have these interviews given the sensitivity of the topic. The state security had started following me after the first interview. All the Cubans I was working with couldn’t understand why we weren’t being arrested. But we kept going until we landed every interview on my wish list. Then it was just a matter of getting that material out.
While I probably should have quit while I was ahead, my purpose this time around was to knock on the door of one of the most politically radioactive residences in the country—the wife of Guillermo Rigondeux, a 30-year-old two-time Olympic boxing champion, branded by Fidel Castro as a Judas and traitor to the Cuban people. I was there to track down the family of one of the most notorious defectors in Cuban history.
Since Rigondeaux had escaped on a smuggler’s boat (venture humanitarianism between Cuba and Cancun has thrived enormously the last few years) and become a permanent exile, his family had been living under 24-hour surveillance and nearly house arrest. Cuban state security doesn’t fuck around. As attractive an analogy it might be for any foreigner to view Rigondeaux as a kind of Orpheus, a highly charged defector forever abandoning his life, nobody is in any hurry to have a camera and a microphone placed in the face of Eurydice to discuss the matter. The official state version of events is quite sufficient, muchas gracias. Bienvenido a Cuba!
Everyone on the island knows that at Castro’s first trial, when he was asked to confess who was intellectually responsible for his attack against Batista, he proclaimed it was none other than “a poet.” But whether Cuba’s Comandante likes it or not, his country is poetry of a different order, something like 1984 penned by Charles Dickens.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE!
http://www.salon.com/2012/12/3.....left_cuba/
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 14:23
AND FOR THE END OF THE YEAR, ONE LAST ONE ON THE JAILS IN CUBA SUBJECT!
MIAMI HERALD: Cuban inmates complain of poor conditions, food in video smuggled from Havana prison - Inmates at the Combinado del Este — Cuba’s largest and possibly most notorious prison — complain of prison conditions and lousy food. - By Juan O. Tamayo
Ten videos smuggled out of Cuba’s biggest and reputedly worst prison, in an unusually daring operation by a dissident, show grotesquely dirty toilets, grimy walls, leaking sewage and food described as worse than “animal feed.”
“Show this video to the international community, how this miserable dictatorship commits cruelties against humanity,” says the videos’ main narrator, an India citizen serving a 30-year sentence in Havana’s high security Combinado del Este prison.
Havana dissident journalist Dania Virgen García, who writes the blog “Cuba por Dentro” — Inside Cuba — said the videos were shot in late January with a digital camera smuggled into the prison “so that everyone can see Cuba’s reality.” They were provided exclusively to El Nuevo Herald.
The videos — which also showed several inmates, including a U.S. citizen complaining about prison conditions — appeared to be the first ever smuggled out of Cuba’s 200-plus prisons. Their views of prison buildings matched those of the Combinado del Este prison.
The videos show a string of almost unimaginably filthy toilets, little more than holes on the floor of prisoners’ cells, many of them with walls so moldy from the humidity of the leaking sewage and water that they were nearly black.
One inmate used a blue plastic 55-gallon drum in his cell to capture the leaking water and use it to flush the toilet and bathe. He also had rigged an electrical wire to heat up a five-gallon bucket of water for his bath.
Also shown were a couple of empty six-man punishment cells known as tapiadas, or sealed, because their doors are solid steel rather than bars and they have no windows, just a row of slits about two inches wide and two feet high.
Several clips show a prison yard described as “dirtier than a chicken house floor” and dotted with pieces of masonry that fell from the surrounding cells. One narrator says inmates are allowed outside for only one hour Monday through Friday.
The prison hospital, shown only from the outside, has no medicines at all and is known as “the slaughter house,” says Dalvinder Singh Jagpal, who appears to have been the main videographer and narrator.
Singh describes Fidel and Raúl Castro in several clips as “worse than al-Qaida” and adds, “They are anti-human. They are monsters.”
YOUTUE VIDEO #1: La cárcel Cubana por dentro (The interior of the Cuban jail)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....r_embedded
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 14:22
YOUTUBE: The True Cuba — what Political Prisoners have to tell - Even after the visit of the Pope in spring 2012, in Cuba there are still several hundred political prisoners in jail. However, most people, especially Cuba tourists, know nothing about it because of the strict censorship. Those dissidents in jail suffer even more then political prisoners in other dictatorships, for instance the former prisoners in East Germany before 1989. Their families are not allowed to work, they often are sick, the International Red Cross or Human Rights Organisations like the International Society for human rights of Frankfurt-Germany cannot visit them.
There exist almost no television or newspaper reports about their sad fate.
Very rarely a few dissidents are released from jail - but immediately they are sent into exile without their families. For the first time since years dissidents in this video tell the free world how badly they have suffered in the jails of Cuba.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Aiar3W_BIY
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 14:22
291 RCR!! YOU REALLY SHOULD NOT GET ME STARTED DEAR!
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH: Prisoners generally are confined in poor and abusive conditions, often in overcrowded cells. Officials frequently punish political prisoners who complain about poor conditions or do not obey prison rules with long periods in punitive isolation cells, restriction on visits, or denial of medical treatment. Cuba does not permit the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to visit prisoners in Cuba; the last ICRC visit to a Cuban prison was in 1989.
http://www.hrw.org/sites/defau.....mmary.html
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 14:21
“BAD U.S.A., BAD U.S.A.! BLAME THE MESSENGER”!! 291 RCR! THAT SONG HAS BEEN HEARD ON THESE COMMENT SECTIONS SO MANY TIMES THAT YOU SHOULD BE GETTING RESIDUALS! BUT PLEASE, CLARIFY FOR ME ONE THING! WHY HAVE THE CASTROFASCITS REFUSE TO ALLOW THE INTERNATIONAL RED CROSS OR THE U.N. SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR INTO THE ISLAND’S JAILS DEAR?
UNITED NATIONS: Situation of human rights in Cuba - 24 October 1995
III. CONDITIONS IN THE PRISONS
37. Non-governmental sources have informed the Special Rapporteur that
they have recorded the existence of 294 prisons and correctional labour
camps throughout the country; it is estimated that there are between
100,000 and 200,000 prisoners in all categories; this figure represents a
very high proportion of the country’s population. It is also a matter of
concern, bearing in mind the fact that the Special Rapporteur is still
receiving reports on the precarious living conditions in the prisons, such
as those described below.
38. In early 1995, there was an epidemic of leptospirosis at the Combinado
del Este prison which resulted in the deaths of several inmates. More than
100 prisoners had to be hospitalized.
39. The Special Rapporteur has received a list of 26 inmates of a section
of the Kilo 7 prison, in the province of Camaguey, who allegedly had
tuberculosis. Moreover, in February 1995, an outbreak of diarrhoea
apparently affected the great majority of the 1,300 inmates of that prison.
An outbreak of tuberculosis at the Combinado del Sur prison in Matanzas has
also been reported; there were six deaths at this prison during the past
year. Cases of scabies also appear to be widespread.
http://www.un.org/documents/ga.....50-663.htm
Diciembre 31st, 2012 at 06:33
54 freedom house
HUMBERTO you are starting to slip bad referring to freedom house…….you read the bio an American Organization that promotes governments have to reflect Uncle Sam’s ideals……you are aware that Uncle Sam houses the world larges prisons and that over 65 per cent behind bars are non whites……for your shake read before putting your foot in your mouth
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:38
The post 32 is a perfect example, yet another one, of the depth of ignorance and delusional brainwashed stupidity so characteristic for the team “yoani” and their 1 and a half pioner support brigade.
It is obviously unknown to the id**t author that there are varieties of apples that
GROW
in tropical and sub-tropical zones.
One such apple has even been developed in the neighbouring Bahamas.
It is called Dorsett Golden. There are many more hot climate varieties.
But what would the team “yoani’s” support brigade know…??? They think it is Castros fault that Cuba cannot grow apples. Somehow, bad Castros moved the island south enough to deprive the Cuban people of apples.
It takes an ignorant, and we are talking the wrong wing, conservative and closed-minded, blind and uneducated ignorant, to write a comment such as the comment 32.
These are the persons that attack Cuba and its’ government.
Their worst weapon:
their unbelievable and enormous ignorance.
Every comment these delusional ignorants make speaks for itself and discredit their ideology.
Truth be told, their ideology is already doing a stellar job of discrediting itself, but they are obviously well equipped to speed-up that process.
Well done.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:30
Suchi is the paranoid fear of the nazist dictatorship of the usa nazist gulag of small CUBA, that as soon as h. clinton got the hold of the power, she asked that the ties between Russia, Venezuela and Cuba be examined.
Old plum was looking for signs that Russians might want to build military bases in Cuba again, and was hoping for something to drive the wedge between the three countries. Divide et impera, as all those imperialists love to say. (Divide and rule, for the wrong wing old and uneducated losers).
http://wikileaks.org/Latin-Ame.....robes.html
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:26
“Know your enemy!”, states a usanian ambassador to Chile Craig Kelly.
The criminal is refering to Hugo Chavez and Venezuela. He also strongly recommends
BLACKMAILING other countries in Latin America, in order to draw them away from Chavez and Castro, who usanian nazist criminal ambassador to Chile states “are very popular”.
http://wikileaks.org/U-S-secre.....rmine.html
Five years later, usanian nazist gulag is disintegrating as we speak. Cuba and Venezuela are still strong and independent.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:25
FREEDOM HOUSE: Freedom House Condemns Cuba’s Sentencing of Angel Carromero
Freedom House condemns the Cuban authorities for unjustly sentencing Spanish citizen Angel Carromero to four years in prison in a trial that lacked transparency and due process of law. Freedom House calls on the Cuban government to allow for an independent investigation and to release information to Spanish and Swedish authorities into the circumstances behind the suspicious car crash that killed prominent Cuban human rights activists Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero, for which Carromero was found guilty of vehicular manslaughter on October 15.
Although officially declared to be public, Carromero’s trial was shrouded in secrecy. Dozens of activists were denied entrance, and popular Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez was detained while traveling to the city of Bayamo to cover the trial. These actions were part of a concerted effort by the Cuban government to suppress information surrounding the mysterious crash and prevent questioning of the official version of events.
The trial also lacked testimony from key witness Jens Aron Modig, who was a passenger in the car and survived with minor injuries. In a suspicious chain of events, Modig was released to his native Sweden quickly after stating that he was sleeping at the time of the crash and did not know how it occurred.
Payá’s family has continually questioned the Cuban government’s account of the accident, and has called for an independent investigation. They never filed charges against Carromero, and maintain that he is innocent.
Freedom House consistently places Cuba among the world’s most repressive societies. Cuba is ranked Not Free in Freedom in the World 2012, Freedom House’s survey of political rights and civil liberties, and Not Free in Freedom of the Press 2012. The island nation also received the second-lowest ranking in Freedom on the Net, a study of internet freedom in 47 countries released in 2012.
http://www.freedomhouse.org/ar.....-carromero
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:15
BAD! BAD! BAD OLD U.S.A.! PLAY IT AGAIN SAM!! I MEAN Damir!
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:11
Wikileaks published more of usa cables, revealing the efforts of the nazist gulag usa to
OBSTRUCT
relations between Spain and Cuba.
http://cablesearch.org/cable/v.....+moratinos
usa nazist gulag ambassador in Spain, Aguirre met Spanish Foreign Minister Moratinos to lay the groundwork for a new relationship after
a year of difficult relations with the Socialist government,
but also to make clear US concerns about Spanish policy
toward Venezuela and CUBA and the lingering wounds in
Washington over the Zapatero government’s harsh rhetoric on
Iraq and US electoral politics last year.
That is state terrorism and all usanian nazist gulag participants, all the way to the “president” forrest gump should face the Human Rights Criminal Court in Den Haag.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:09
“It is time to lift the sanctions and this unjust policy that violates all fundamental democratic principles, such as autodetermination”, said Kenny.
YES! LETS DO AWAY WITH THE DOUBLE CURRENCY, SINGLE PARTY SYSTEM, MONOPOLY ON INTERNET AND NEWS TOO! THE CASTROFASCISTS SHOULD STOP VIOLATING ALL FUNDAMENTEAL DEMOCRATIC PRINCIPLES!
THANKS Damir FOR THE INSPIRATION!
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 23:04
Eighteen (18) countries of European Community signed a petition to end the policy of “Common position” against Cuba as it
VIOLATES the basic human rights and democratic prinicples the EU is said to want to uphold.
http://www.cubadebate.cu/notic.....ntra-cuba/
Enda Kenny, the PM of Ireland, argues that this policy limits drastically the communication and economic ties between Cuba and EU, serving only as a complementary policy to the usanian economic embargo and blockade.
“It is time to lift the sanctions and this unjust policy that violates all fundamental democratic principles, such as autodetermination”, said Kenny.
Cuba has the sovereign right to elect its’ own political system and the way into the future.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:49
EL UNIVERSAL CARACAS: Maduro waits for doctors to let him see President Chávez- The Cuban press reported that the Venezuelan vice-president waits for the right time for his visit.
Vice-President Nicolás Maduro arrived Saturday in Havana, Cuba, and the island’s official media said he was waiting for the “right time” to visit Hugo Chávez. This would be the first visit to the Venezuelan president since he underwent his fourth cancer operation in a year and a half. Maduro, who is leading the Venezuelan Executive Office since early December, when he Chávez bestowed powers on him and appointed him as his successor, has provided periodical medical reports on Chávez’s health. Earlier this week, he informed he had talked on the phone with the ailing Venezuelan president. “Nicolás is in Havana, visiting our commander. He is conveying greetings from the people of Venezuela, with love and affection (…) and also asking him to meet the treatment,” said National Assembly Speaker Diosdado Cabello, a top member of ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) during the inauguration of governor of Apure state Ramón Carrizales on Saturday.
“It’s up to him (Chavez) to regain his health,” added Cabello.
Earlier in the day, a brief report published by Cuban state newspaper Granma outlined that Maduro went “straight to the hospital where President Hugo Chávez is being treated to greet his family and Venezuelan Minister of Science and Technology Jorge Arreaza.”
The report, which includes a photo of a smiling Maduro when he was welcomed by Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez, stressed that the vice-president would “discuss with doctors the right time to visit the President (Chávez) during the day.”
Cuban television showed some shots of Maduro’s arrival in Havana on Saturday morning.
The delicate state of health of Chávez, 58, has cast doubt on his strength to continue leading his country and whether he can take oath on January 10 for the new term for which he was reelected in October.
Reports about Chávez’s progress after his surgery on December 11 are not very detailed. Official reports have indicated that he had a complex surgery during which he suffered a hemorrhage and that he was then treated for a respiratory infection.
http://www.eluniversal.com/nac.....ent-chavez
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:49
Copy and paste “genoius”, hillarious comment:
“I have had some oncounters with that mulatto…”
First of all that’s a lie.
Secondly, that’s another confirmation that Spaniard has as much of Cuban blood as I do: the guy is an African black guy, not mulatto. The difference is huge and a
REAL
Cuban
KNOWS
the difference well.
On a lighter side, here’s some more of nazist gulag’s mind control that the team “yoani” and their sad and elderly “helpers” are trying to convince us Cuban government is doing to Cubans:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....85690.html
As we can see, the “mulatto” obama bin barrack is the true nazist. He had signed a continuation of
WARRANTLESS
phone tapping in the usa nazist gulag.
The sad and destroyed country in war with itself.
If only they would kill each other quickly so that the rest of the world can finally live in peace!!!!!
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:28
Damir!! I HAVE HAD SOME ENCOUNTERS WITH THAT MULATO ON YOUR YOUTUBE VIDEO! HE HAS A FOULTH MOUTH AND TRIES TO COME ACROSS AS AN ANTI-CASTRO LIKE ANOTHER FRIEND WHO IS IN SPAIN WHO USE TO HOLD VIGILS WITH A CUBAN FLAG ALONG WITH HIS WIFE IN ONE OF THE SPANISH CITIES. THEY ARE BOTH CONSTANTLY PLATING DOUBT AND SPREADING RUMORS NOT JUST ON YOANI BUT ANY OF THE DISSIDENTS AND POLITICAL PRISONERS IN AND OUT OF THE ISLAND!I HAD TO BLOCK HIM FROM A YOANI SANCHEZ SUPPORT GROUP I HELP RUN ON FACEBOOK BECAUSE HE KEPT TRYING TO POST DEFAMATION VIDEOS WITHOUT ANY PROOF! ONE OF COMMON ASPECTS OF CASTRO AGENTS IS THAT THEY HAVE NO CLASS AND ARE QUICK WITH THE DEFAMATION, CHISME AND FILTHY MOUTH PROVIDING NO PROOF WITH LINK! RING A BELL?
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:24
Wanna some links? Here’s the link:
http://www.vanguardia.co.cu/in.....j_id=26848
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:23
How come you “geniuses” and “champions of freedom and democracy” never write about nazist gulag usa confiscating
ILLEGALLY
223,7 MILLIONS OF DOLLARS THAT ARE LEGALLY cuban MONEY???!!!!
And since 2010 to date, the nazist gulag usa and nigger obama have confiscated over 493 millions of (worthless) usa dollars worth of Cuban finances!!!???
usa had
STOLEN
the money form CUBA ever since the blockade and embargo imposed on the country. Th main effect of that criminal act was that it had empoverished the nation and gave the opportunity to domestic traitors to start miaoing how it is all Castros’ fault and that it is the “socialism” that is making them poor.
All the while the nazist gulag usa was stealling the money from CUBA and investing it in terrorist and drug-trafficking activities around the world.
So, instead of barking on CUBA and Castros, why not change the direction and bark at the
REAL CRIMINALS AND TERRORISTS
the nazist gulag usa???
Since you are all such “champions of democracy”, surely hat should not be a problem, no?
Ah, but when is a hypocrite going to change and turn into an honest an ethical person…
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:18
HUFFINGTON POST: Reforms in Cuba: Two Steps Forward One Step Back - by YOANI SANCHEZ
“Updating the model” is the name the government has given the island’s current process of economic reforms. A series of flexibilities that encourage domestic production to reduce imports, but that maintain State control and central planning. The key achievements have been delivering idle land in a form of leasing known as usufruct, the expansion of self-employment, and the conversion of State-owned establishments to cooperatives. However, among the main tasks still incomplete are eliminating the dual currency system, ending the rationing system, and increasing salaries at least enough to cover basic needs. As long as salaries do not allow workers to have a decent life, many people will turn to emerging enterprises, many of them illegal and tied to the tourism sector.
Preventing the accumulation of capital also seems to be one of the great scourges of the new transformations. The guidelines discourage contracting for labor beyond five workers; establish excessive taxes for the private sector; prevent a single person from buying more than one home and even having more than one phone line. All are policies that confirm the intention to limit individual wealth. The main fear of the government centers on the possibility that economic reforms will create a foundation to demand political reforms. That is, that the ability of many to achieve material and financial autonomy from the State will inevitably spark desires for autonomy in the civic arena and increase pressures for respect of human rights.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE ESSAY!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....85602.html
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:02
He is a self-confessed disliker of Cuban government. He lives abroad and hopes for a change in Cuba. You have to give it to him. He’s eloqunt and he KNOWS what he is talking about. I liked especially the part where he talks about the family of the dissident traitor and wannabe Castro after Castros!
An uncle a general from revolution, an aunt working in State Security!!! The family of this “champion of democracy in Cuba” traitor and double agent Rodiles, according to the Cuban dissidents in Europe!!!
One cannot but laugh at the transparent duplicity of this liar and a clown “yoani”!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyESmy3j5L4
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 22:00
THE ONLY CRAZINESS IS THAT OF YOU SAD AND OLD LOSERS WHO DO NOT WANT TO ACCEPT THE FACT THAT YOUR IMPERIALIST NASZISM IS THE REASON FOR ALL EVIL IN THE WORLD.
AND FOR THAT I AM THANKFUL. IT ONLY REINFORCES THE FUTILITY OF YOUR IDEOLOGY AND ITS INEVITABLE END, WHICH HAS COME AND THERE’S NO RETURN.
THE ONLY WAY FOR NAZIST IMEPRIALISM (”some kind of pragmatic capitlaism”) IS
DOWN!!!!!
THE ONLY WAY FOR SHIFT TO GO.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 21:53
THE RINGING IN OF THE NEW YEAR WOULD NOT RING AS CRAZY WITHOUT OUR Damir!
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 21:30
And more ignorance and false ifdeological propaganda by the helper loser equally ignorant by her/his own choosing:
“For example, US telecom companies have offered the Cuban government the best deal for high speed internet and every type of communication from satellite to cell-phone.
No they didn’t. That was cia who would have financed spying on Cuban people and govcernment, just as they did in Europe, for which France put them in court and threw them out of France. But you would not want to know these “insignificant little details”, now would you ignorant.
Castro decided to pay Venezuelan and other foreign firms a much higher price for promised high-speed communications that still isn’t available to Cubans.”
Again, a lot of lies and ignorance employed o spread lies and ideological imperialist propaganda.
Reuters and bbc have covered this topic to a great length and only an internet ignorant, like the poster of the post 35, cannot do some basic search to find all the info from her/his own capitalist/imperialist propaganda machines stating CLEARLY that nazist usa gulag was actually trying to
STOP CUBA
from having the internet.
Bunch of liars and nazist imperialist cre**s.
The more you say, the more you make fools of yourselves.
Keep the good job up!!!
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 21:15
SANTA CAME A LITTLE LATE FOR ME THIS YEAR! AND I’M NOT SORRY THAT HUGO CHAVEZ IS DYING OR IS DEAD! SO MANY PEOPLE WILL BE SAVED BY HIS PARTING!
WASHINGTON POST: Venezuelan vice president says Chavez has suffered ‘new complications,’ health ‘delicate’
CARACAS, Venezuela — Hugo Chavez has suffered “new complications” following his cancer surgery in Cuba, his vice president said Sunday, describing the Venezuelan leader’s condition as delicate.
Vice President Nicolas Maduro did not give details about the complications, which he said came amid a respiratory infection. Maduro spoke in a televised address from Cuba.
Maduro had arrived in Havana on Saturday in a sudden and unexpected trip to visit Chavez. He said on Sunday that he would remain in Havana “for the coming hours” but didn’t specify how long.
The vice president spoke with a solemn expression alongside Chavez’s eldest daughter, Rosa, and son-in-law Jorge Arreaza, as well as Attorney General Cilia Flores.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....story.html
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 21:10
The post 32 is a perfect example, yet another one, of the depth of ignorance and delusional brainwashed stupidity so characteristic for the team “yoani” and their 1 and a half pioner support brigade.
It is obviously unknown to the id**t author that there are varieties of apples that
GROW
in tropical and sub-tropical zones.
One such apple has even been developed in the neighbouring Bahamas.
It is called Dorsett Golden. There are many more hot climate varieties.
But what would the team “yoani’s” support brigade know…??? They think it is Castros fault that Cuba cannot grow apples. Somehow, bad Castros moved the island south enough to deprive the Cuban people of apples.
It takes an ignorant, and we are talking the wrong wing, conservative and closed-minded, blind and uneducated ignorant, to write a comment such as the comment 32.
These are the persons that attack Cuba and its’ government.
Their worst weapon:
their unbelievable and enormous ignorance.
Every comment these delusional ignorants make speaks for itself and discredit their ideology.
Truth be told, their ideology is already doing a stellar job of discrediting itself, but they are obviously well equipped to speed-up that process.
Well done.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 20:14
I WONDER WHAT WILL HAPPEN ON TONIGHT’S EPISODE OF THE TELENOVELA “AS THE CUBAVENE OR VENECUBA TURNS” (nod to Carol Burnett Show)!!
LA PATILLA: Venezuelan Vice-President Maduro will speak tonight from Cuba - 30 December 2012 - Minister of Communication and Information, Ernesto Villegas, announced Sunday via Twitter that Vice President Nicolás Maduro will make a speech from Havana.
Maduro hablará esta noche desde Cuba - diciembre 30, 2012 - El ministro de Comunicación e Información, Ernesto Villegas, anunció este domingo por Twitter que el vicepresidente Nicolás Maduro realizará una alocución desde La Habana.
http://www.lapatilla.com/site/.....esde-cuba/
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 14:59
FROM A CASTRO “GOVERNMENT” WEB SITE! THIS IS ONE OF THE CONDITIONS THAT THE CASTROFASCISTS WANTED AS A TRADE FOR SPANISH HOSTAGE ANGEL CARROMERO! THE OTHERS WERE $3 MILLION DOLLARS AND TO FOREVER SHUT HIS MOUTH AS REPORTED BY SPANISH NEWS SOURCE ZoomNews. THE CASTRO MAFIA WAS FIRST ASKING FOR $5 MILLION BUT THEY GAVE THE SPANISH GOVERNMENT A GOOD MAFIA DISCOUNT!
CUBASI: EU Orgs. Demand Elimination of Common Stand on Cuba
Organizations from 18 countries signed a setter addressed to the Irish presidency of the European Union, demanding the lift of the so-called Common Position on Cuba, which is in violation of international principles like free self-determination.
In the message, addressed to the next president of the EU, Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny, the signatories recall that this policy, promoted in 1996 by then head of Spanish Government Jose Maria Aznar, is obsolete and has been condemned by numerous European parliamentarians.
The so-called Common Position limits drastically the relations with Cuba and functions as a complement to the unfair blockade maintained for over 50 years by the United States, adds the text.
Europe must take firm steps for a just, constructive policy towards Cuba, a policy oriented to the future, say the signatories, considering that the UN voting against the US blockade is a positive symbol and an important message, but the EU must go from words to deeds and cancel immediately the counterproductive Common Position.
It is time to lift that measure that violates international principles, like self-determination, says the text undersigned by France Cuba and Cuba Si France and associations of friendship with Cuba in Austria, Belgium, Biosnia Herzegovina, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Britain.
The issue of the Common Position was examined in November in a meeting of Foreign ministers of the EU, where no concrete progress made made towards its elimination.
http://news.cubasi.cu/index.ph.....nd-on-cuba
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 11:55
Griffin, you’re quite right about some of the stuff Yoani writes. It’s hard to be informed in Cuba.
But Yoani is probably right that some Communist official gets bribed or ordered to import NZ butter for political reasons.
Whether NZ butter is a better deal than US butter or not, the Communist official won’t import something based on economic sense.
For example, US telecom companies have offered the Cuban government the best deal for high speed internet and every type of communication from satellite to cell-phone.
Castro decided to pay Venezuelan and other foreign firms a much higher price for promised high-speed communications that still isn’t available to Cubans.
Likewise, a friend of mine wanted to sell fresh juice on the street in Havana. He had the fruit from a friend’s farm and he had a blender. What he didn’t have was Castro’s permission so he went to jail.
So I can’t buy pure juice on the street, but the dollar stores are full of imported sugar-laden fruit juice sold at an astronomical price because Castro INC is in complete control, all its management is on the take from foreign firms, and they allow no competition from the honest Cuban citizen.
Maybe it’s legal now to open a juice stand, I don’t know, but my friend’s blender is still with the police and he’s still broke.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 07:44
¡Feliz año nuevo Yoani!
Corruption in totalitarian countries has been and is widespread. Cuba is no exception.
For example, corruption is so bad in China that the death penalty is often used against politicians and Chinese “elite” …
The only time this corruption is revealed is when somebody who is aware of it doesn’t get a cut of the illicit profits, and then gets angry and opens their mouth so that the public learn of the graft.
The Fidelisto “elite”, protected by the secret police, are above the law in Cuba. It’s as simple as that.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 00:24
It is curious to read Yoani’s essay about New Zealand butter. She is clearly an intelligent & educated woman, as is the economist she consulted. But neither of them are aware of the basic economics of international trade and instead suspect some high Cuban official must own the foreign factory where the butter is made. Ignorance and suspicions flourish in a closed society like Cuba where the govt propaganda is thick with conspiracies.
Diciembre 30th, 2012 at 00:18
Damir,
You really are an !diot sometimes. Apples do not grow in tropical climates such as Cuba because the apple trees need a winter season to set the buds that will bloom in spring. So what the heck were you blathering on about?
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 21:01
He is a self-confessed disliker of Cuban government. He lives abroad and hopes for a change in Cuba. You have to give it to him. He’s eloqunt and he KNOWS what he is talking about. I liked especially the part where he talks about the family of the dissident traitor and wannabe Castro after Castros!
An uncle a general from revolution, an aunt working in State Security!!! The family of this “champion of democracy in Cuba” traitor and double agent, according to the Cuban dissidents in Europe!!!
One cannot but laugh at the transparent duplicity of this liar and a clown “yoani”!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyESmy3j5L4
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 20:46
INTERESTING DATA! THE BRAZILIANS MAKE MORE MILK THAN NEW ZEALAND BUT YET THE CUBANS DONT BUY FROM THEN! BRAZIL IS A BIG SUPPORTER OF CUBA, SO WHY IS THAT? AND FOR THAT MATTER SO IS GERMANY AND FRANCE! YOU KNOW IM SUCH A DUNCE SO IF ANYONE HAS A RATIONAL ANSWER PLEAS POST, WITH LINK OF COURSE!
World Top 10 Cow’s Milk Producing Countries in 2010 in Tonnes
The tonne (SI symbol: t) is a metric system unit of mass equal to 1,000 kilograms ( 2,204.6 pounds).
2008 2009 2010
USA: 86,177,400 85,880,500 87,461,300
Brazil: 28,440,500 30007800 31,667,600
Germany: 28,656,300 29,198,700 29,628,900
France: 23,564,900 22,653,100 23,301,200
New Zealand: 15,216,800 15,667,400 17,010,500
http://www.dairyco.org.uk/mark.....roduction/
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 20:23
The “yournalsit team yoani” have “stumbled” upon a “great truth”.
Paranois, you bet! And keep telling that to yourselves until you get that into your paranoid skulls, the team “yoani”!!!
And then shut down this sordid and useless page.
A true journalist, something you cannot even hope to aspire to let alone be, would find out and publish the name of the “Cuban higher-up and the NZ company.
What are you affraid of the team “yoani”?
To divulge the name of some cousin or uncle, that is what you are affraid of.
Hypocrite.
Just stop this farce already. We all know that you are a fake dissident, that you are “made in Cuba” and that you are nothing but an incompetent white “gods” bum licker.
Your “complaints” about Cuban “reality” have failed to reveal a single real fact and/or problem in Cuba.
And even if you dare touch something of importance, yo “write” in vague and very generic terms, whith no names, no facts no truth.
That is
NOT
how a
REAL opposition behaves.
You had a chance to put up your pin-up granny for municipal elections and didn’t.
You had a chance to put up your granny for general assembly elections and you didn’t.
You have stripped yourselves of any credibility whatsoever. No amount of low-hungs”, “helpless” or copy and paste “genius” fake profiles will make up for the lack of true political involvement.
Trying to break in a court room, where police completely legally arrests your loser domestic traitor elements is
NOT
a proof of political engagement. Just a tuggery by your naive and ignorant domestic traitors and wannabe Castros.
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 20:11
More bullshift. Unbelievable talent by the team “yoani to make ani issue of things that are not an issue is at work yet again.
I had to chuckle reading the comment (the monologue the “friendly translator still paddles thinking we do not know she is behind 99% of those comments…) “exchange” below showing full and complete ignorance of the author.
See, there’s actually a lot of fruit production now going in Cuba. A number of agricultors is turning to production, and successfully, of the fruit and vegetables.
There is increased production of a number of fruits until recently not available in Cuba. Some are already in production, others will take a year or two still. It is only a matter of time when peaches and apples grown in Cuba will flood local markets.
It is funny how these “democracy” fighters are calling on Castros to provide everything and they come from capitalist ruins where individuals are the preferred producing force…
That is called
HYPOCRISY.
One MUST be a cr**en to disregard the fact that in socialism private iniciative is just fine. In this stupidity and ignorance these “freedom champions” are actually the same as their idols Castros.
Neither knew that.
Hypocrites and mo**ns.
Next, when pars and apples become regular item on the markets, they will say: “Yeah, but Castros do not allow Cubans to eat apples the whole year round.”
Disregarding the fact that
ALL fruit and vegetables are
SEASONAL
products, they will complain that Castros “prohibit and/or control” the imports, denying to Cubans apples all year round, forgetting that even in capitalism apples only bear fruit during a limited period of the year. The rest of the year, “free aome kind of pragmatic capitalists” eat old apples (or other fruit), that have been stored from even years ago).
Dumbf**ks.
If you complain about something, complain about the real problems.
Yeah, but with all those uncles and aunts, and parents in Cuban army and State Services, as if the team “yoani’s” domestic traitors would go that far.
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 19:37
Using NZ butter as an example is not that useful. NZ has the most efficient aand unsubsidised agricultural sector in the world by a country mile. It also has massive cost advantages - a temperate climate with sufficient rainfall that allows livestock to stay outdoors year round with sufficient pasture — i.e. no expensive feeds required. The average dairy farm in NZ is significantly more efficinet than competitors in Europe or the USA or emerginf dairy exporters like Chile, Uruguay etc.
For many years now NZ has been able to grow and export milk products, lamb etc to anywhere in the world cheaper than the domestic producers in that country cna produce. All without any government subsidies. Fonterra, the NZ farmer co-operative is a ruthless producer and marketer, and responsibel for 30% of global dairy exports, all on the back of 12,000 farmers.
Cuba would be unusual in Glabal terms if it were not importing NZ butter (pretty much every country innthe world imports NZ butter or milk powder)- NZ butter is almost always cheaper than the locally produced alternative and always of the highest quality. I could never claim there arent middlemen from Cuba making a tax like profit on imports, but butter from NZ isn’t being produced in a Cuban owned factory.
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 19:26
RTV ESPAÑA/SPAIN PUBLIC TELEVISION VIDEO : Full interview of Oswaldo Paya’s brother -29 December 2012 (Spanish only)
SUZANNE T. SANZ. - TVE talks with the brother of Oswaldo Paya, the Cuban dissident who died in the car crash where Angel Carromero was driving. Entrevista íntegra al hermano de Oswaldo Payá -29 dic 2012
SUSANA T. SANZ.- TVE ha hablado con el hermano de Oswaldo Payá, el disidente cubano que murió en el accidente de coche que conducía Ángel Carromero.
http://www.rtve.es/alacarta/vi.....a/1629111/
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 18:20
I hope next Year 2013 will be the best One for You! Happy New Year!
Elina from Sweden
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 17:00
EIN PRESSWIRE: Hunger Strike Demanding Immediate Release Of Alan Gross And Eduardo Arocena
Gualdo Hidalgo, Latin Heritage Foundation Executive Director and former Cuban political prisoner, starts a hunger strike demanding from United States and Cuba governments the immediate release of Eduardo Arocena and Alan Gross.
Alan Phillip Gross is an American international development expert who was working in Cuba as a U.S. government subcontractor for the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) when he was arrested and ultimately convicted for acts against the independence or the territorial integrity of the state.
He was prosecuted in 2011 after being accused of crimes against the Cuban state. Gross alleges he was bringing satellite phones and computer equipment to members of Cuba’s Jewish community. It was claimed Gross’s objective involved setting up Cuban dissidents with satellite communication systems that would work through satellite phones and laptops. He is serving a 15-year prison sentence in Cuba.
Eduardo Arocena was convicted of serious crimes against federal laws of the United States through the use of violence, including the assassination of Cuban diplomat Felix Garcia Rodriguez. However, nearly thirty years in prison met by Eduardo Arocena, according to international standards of detention, including Cuba, are considered sufficient for the release of a convict. Since 1959, Cuba has imprisoned many of the anti-Castro fighters for acts considered by Cuba as terrorists with actions that caused death of civilians. Virtually all those convicted has been freed by Cuba after serving a prison term shorter than the one served by Eduardo Arocena.
The U.S. government should take into consideration the long prison terms served by Eduardo Arocena and order his release immediate.
Cuba’s government should order the immediate release of Alan Gross for reunification with his wife, daughters and other family, while restoring his health problems.
The circumstances of the contemporary world should prevail in both governments, both of Washington such as Havana, and help alleviate the suffering of the prisoners and their families.
Gualdo Hidalgo, former Cuban political prisoner and Latin Heritage Foundation publisher, will keep the hunger strike until both governments agree to release Eduardo Arocena y Alan Gross.
Gualdo Hidalgo
Latin Heritage Foundation
(908)-835-`1045
http://world.einnews.com/pr_ne.....do-arocena
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 13:42
ACCORDING TO AN INTERVIEW TO SPANISH NEWS EFE, THE ATTORNEY FOR ANGEL CARROMEREO, José María Viñals SAID THAT HE WAS NOT ALLOWED TO VIEW THE “EVIDENCE” AGAINST HIS CLIENT AT THE HAVANA TRIAL! ANOTHER KANGAROO TRIAL TO SET UP A HOSTAGE IN ORDER TO GET CONCESSIONS FROM SPAIN AND POSSIBLY OTHER EUROPEAN COUNTRIES SUCH AS REMOVING “THE COMMON POSITION” TOWARDS CUBA THAT WAS A RESULT OF THE “BLACK SPRING” ARRESTS OF 2003!
FOX NEWS: Spaniard jailed in Cuba flies home to serve remainder of 4-year sentence for deadly car crash
MADRID – A Spaniard sentenced in Cuba to prison for the death of a prominent dissident has arrived back in Spain to serve the rest of his four-year term after an agreement between the two governments.Angel Carromero Barrios, a Spanish regional political youth leader, lost control of his car and crashed on July 22, killing passengers Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero. Paya was a well-known opponent of the Cuban government and Cepero was also a dissident. Carromero flew into Madrid’s Barajas international airport with a police escort Saturday alongside Miguel Vives, another Spanish citizen sentenced to 18 years prison in Cuba for drug trafficking.
The governments of Cuba and Spain applied a bilateral accord dating from 1998 which allows for the enforcement of each other’s criminal judgments.
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2.....tence-for/
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 12:23
The Cuban economy is inefficient because all of the conditions necessary for efficiency have been outlawed. On top of that, the dual currency system distorts the economy. Businesses dealing in dollars are vastly more profitable (but not more efficient) than businesses dealing in local pesos. This situation makes it irrelevant for dollar businesses to be efficient. Thus more and more economic activity is sucked away from the local peso economy to the dollar economy.
The state enterprise in charge of importing food is earning millions buying and selling New Zealand butter, crushing the local dairy farmers who are forced to work in the local peso economy. No doubt the managers of the importing firm are doing nicely too.
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 10:13
[...] a post titled “New Zealand Butter,” Cuban blogger Yoani Shanchez tries to explain why Cuba has so many expensive basic food [...]
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 09:27
Here’s my theory Ken.
If Castro let just one Cuban put Cuban fruit in a blender, package it and sell it on the international market without paying huge bribes to Castro Corporation, Cuba would have a competitive product.
And the free Cuban could easily pay his workers at least 10 times the wages they get from Castro Corporation.
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 09:16
Ken,
New Zealand Butter was just one of the many products Yoani mentioned. Why can`t Castro Corporation produce any product efficiently?
And low wages and low worker protection are the number one reason why big corporations would rather produce in China or Bangladesh than in the USA.
Cuba has an average wage lower than the minimum wage in Haiti and no worker protection, you would think Castro Corporation could compete in something.
Castro even tried to sell prison labor to IKEA, but the quality was too lousy for IKEA.
Why can`t Castro Corporation compete?
Yoani mentioned one of several reasons - complete corruption of the Communist hierarchy.
Another linked reason is that no Cuban wants to work for Castro corporation since they are supported by billions of dollars pouring in each year from their families and friends in the USA and elsewhere. This creates the black market, the real economy of Cuba.
If Cubans lived on their wages they’d all be starving.
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 02:47
Assuming what you say is true, Ken, Cuba buys dairy (not diary) products from New Zealand only because it suits the dictator of Cuba. Food riots in the streets of Havana are the last thing Raul wants. The point is, Cuba can’t produce enough of its own dairy products on the island and has to import them from half a world away. What a great revolution, huh?
Diciembre 29th, 2012 at 00:51
No, Anon, “everyone” is not making your point, just a couple of head the balls.
Efficient production relies on many things and wages are the least important. New Zealand is a high wage economy that has poured resources into making her diary industry the most efficient in the world. That is why Cuba buys from her and not from Jamaica, say.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 23:10
Ken,
To follow the point everyone is making is this:
The AVERAGE wage of a CUBAN is less than HALF the MINIMUM WAGE of a HAITIAN.
How come the Castro Corporation can’t compete with any agricultural product whatsoever?
Castro Corporation imports TROPICAL FRUIT JUICE and charges more for it than rich consumers pay in countries where tropical fruit doesn’t even grow!
Can you come up with a rational economic explanation for all that?
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 22:19
I HOPE THIS AWFUL TELENOVELA DEATH SCENE WILL BE OVER SOON!
MIAMI HERALD: Venezuelan VP heads to Cuba to visit ailing Chavez - By FABIOLA SANCHEZ
CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuelan Vice President Nicolas Maduro announced Friday night that he was traveling to Cuba to visit President Hugo Chavez, who is recovering from cancer surgery in Havana.
Maduro said during the inauguration of a state governor that he and other government officials would fly to Cuba late Friday. He did not specify how long he would be away but said Energy Minister Hector Navarro would be in charge of government affairs in the meantime.
Maduro’s trip comes amid growing uncertainty about Chavez’s health.
The Venezuelan leader has not been seen or heard from since undergoing his fourth cancer-related surgery Dec. 11, and government officials have said he might not return in time for his scheduled Jan. 10 inauguration for a new six-year term. There have been no updates on Chavez’s condition since Maduro announced Monday night that he had received a phone call from the president who was up and walking.
Maduro is the highest ranking Venezuelan official to visit Chavez since the surgery. Bolivian President Evo Morales traveled to Cuba last weekend in a quick trip that only added to the uncertainty surrounding Chavez’s condition. Morales has not commented publicly on his visit or even confirmed that he saw Chavez while he was there.
Earlier Friday, Maduro read a New Year message from Chavez to Venezuelan troops, though it was unclear when the president composed it.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE!
http://www.miamiherald.com/201.....havez.html
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 21:59
No, the only reason New Zealand is able to undercut prices for butter in Cuba is because the efficiencies that should exist in Cuba have been expropriated and stolen by the dictatorship. You are simply exploiting the vacuum and taking advantage of a market where increased costs are tolerated because there are no alternatives. The Cuban people are the victims.
Enjoy it while it lasts, but you are exploiting people, just like Castro. Your efficiencies are based on a criminal, false economy. Remember, the Castros are murderers, they killed people to get where they are. So keep selling your butter if you can in good conscience.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 21:39
Ken!! LETS NOT “BET”, LETS SHOW STATISTICS WITH LINK! WE LIKE THOSE LINKS AROUND HERE, IT SHOWS SOME HOMEWORK HAS BEEN DONE AND NOT JUST BLAH, BLAH, BLAH!
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 21:25
Just to follow on from my last comment, I would be willing to bet that New Zealand supplies the whole region with its butter, probably via one giant refigerated ship. Adding Cuba to the list of ports does not add anything to overall costs.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 21:23
No, economies of scale exist on the supply side. They are contingent upon production being made so efficient that transport costs can be borne easily. Thus the UK is awash with New Zealand butter and lamb, both of which undercut the locally produced alternatives. I doubt if Cuban agriculture can compete with the ruthlessly organised New Zealand Dairy Board, and is probably not trying, which is why they buy from New Zealand - as do we.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 20:41
Ken,
Mediocre post at best, but thanks for trying.
Economies of scale only exist if there are efficiencies to be gained as a result of scale. Those efficiencies can only be realized by virtue of reduced transaction fees, transportation costs, manufacturing costs and opportunity costs.
Yoani’s point in this essay is pretty simple. The end consumer in Cuba does not benefit from any of those supposed efficiencies because they don’t exist in Cuba. That’s why she wants answers. She and her fellow prisoners on that island pay exorbitant prices for staples. The only reason butter in sufficient quantities is not produced in Cuba is because the dictatorship is corrupt and incompetent; it does not work and never will.
Your second mistake is to think that anyone wants to denigrate Cuba. Cuba is an island of 11 or 12 million people and millions of expats. No one is against the long suffering people of Cuba. The singular problem in Cuba is the dictatorship. The dictatorship is what people oppose. The dictatorship in Cuba is composed of a group of self-serving autocrats who think they are entitled to impose their desire on everyone else — at the expense of everyone else.
Look at 19th and 20th Century world history to see how that has turned out. On which side do you stand?
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 20:30
Re: #8,
A common excuse I’ve heard many times in Cuba, and from Castro’s defenders abroad, is that the embargo pushes es up the cost of goods by forcing Cuba to buy imports from far away, like Europe or China, or in this case, New Zealand. That this excuse is nonsense is clear enough to anybody with basic economic knowledge. Thus it is also revealing of the information bubble that Cubans live under, imposed by the State. That said, foreign Leftists who resort to that excuse have nobody but themselves to blame for their foolishness.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 19:40
Yeah, well if you really spoke to an economist then you would know that New Zealand dairy products are some of the cheapest in the world and economies of scale means that you can load a ship up to the brim with butter and then drop off consignments all around a region such as the Caribbean.
I realise that your aim is to denigrate Cuba at every turn, but this latest post makes no economic sense at all.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 17:12
And another problem is what Yoani talks about, the complete corruption of the big Communists who run this feudal dictatorship.
How many Swiss bank accounts do they have out there? How many millions of dollars are in them?
I’m sorry Yoani, we’ll never know everything, but I hope we get a part of the story one day.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 17:07
And despite Cuba drowning in foreign products, there are still idiots who think there exists an embargo against Cuba.
How can one have an intelligent conversation with these idiots?
The problem is the AVERAGE wage of Castro’s serfs is LESS than ONE-HALF the MINIMUM WAGE IN HAITI.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 14:31
SO WHERE IS THE EXCUSE OF THE CUBAN “GOVERNMENT” ABOUT HAVING TO IMPORT FOOD BECAUSE OF THE BAD OLD US EMBARGO AND THEIR LACK OF MACHINERY?
BELARUSIAN TELEGRAPH AGENCY: Cuba to buy more Belarusian tractors in 2013
MINSK, 28 December (BelTA) – Cuba will expand the procurement of Belarusian tractors in 2013, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Cuba to the Republic of Belarus Alfredo Nieves Portuondo told a press conference on 28 December, BelTA has learnt. According to the Ambassador, in 2012 the economic cooperation between Cuba and Belarus has been gaining momentum. “This year we continued purchasing latest technological modifications of high-quality Belarusian tractors. We are going to buy even more tractors next year,” the diplomat said. Over 10,000 MTZ tractors are operated in Cuba now. “Belarusian tractors have earned a good reputation in Cuba, Venezuela and other countries of Latin America, including Ecuador and Nicaragua,” he said. The bilateral cooperation in the manufacturing industry is not only about supplies of Belarusian machinery. At present maintenance centers for Belarusian machines are being arranged in Cuba. The Latin American country is now busy upgrading its agricultural production; therefore, Cuba needs tractors and other farm machines.
news.belta.by/en/news/econom?id=703014
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 02:08
Cuba continues to purchase more of it’s food needs from abroad because the system is incapable of producing enough at home. it’s that simple. The problem is the trend will increase, while the ability to pay for it decreases. At some point, the Cuban government will not be able to purchase enough food from abroad. This is when famine happens.
That which cannot be sustained, won’t be sustained.
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 01:02
CUBA TRANSITION PROJECT: CUBA FACTS - Socio-Economic Conditions in Pre-Castro Cuba - Issue 43- December 2008
CONSUMPTION:
The 1960 UN Statistical yearbook ranked pre-Revolutionary Cuba third out of 11 Latin American countries in per capita daily caloric consumption. This was in spite of the fact that the latest available food consumption data for Cuba at the time was from 1948-49, almost a decade before the other Latin American countries’ data being used in the comparison.
A closer look at the latest available data on some basic food groups reveals that Cubans now have less access to cereals, tubers, and meats than they had in the late 1940’s. According to 1995 UN FAO data, Cuba’s per capita supply of cereals has fallen from 106 kg per year in the late 1940’s to 100 kg half a century later. Per capita supply of tubers and roots shows an even steeper decline, from 91 kg per year to 56 kg. Meat supplies have fallen from 33 kg per year to 23 kg per year, measured on a per capita basis.
Although some would blame Cuba’s food problems on the U.S. embargo, the facts suggest that the food shortages are a function of an inefficient collectivized agricultural system — and a scarcity of foreign exchange resulting from Castro’s unwillingness to liberalize Cuba’s economy, diversify its export base, and its need to pay off debts owed to its Japanese, European, and Latin American trading partners acquired during the years of abundant Soviet aid. This foreign exchange shortage has severely limited Cuba’s ability to purchase readily available food supplies from the U.S., Canada, Latin America, and Europe. The U.S. embargo does not prohibit Cuba from buying food in the U.S
CLICK LINK FOR MORE STATISTICS!
http://ctp.iccas.miami.edu/FAC.....cember.htm
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 00:51
MERCO PRESS: Cuba imports 60% of rice consumption, the basic diet; main supplier Vietnam - Cuba is forced to import more than 400,000 tons of rice each year, 60% of the total amount of this dietary staple consumed on the island, according to official figures published Sunday by the daily Juventud Rebelde. - July 20th 2011
Cuba in 2011 will have to import almost double the rice it produces for consumption on the island, calculated at more than 600,000 tons.
Vietnam is Cuba’s main rice provider, according to government sources.
Cuba’s 11.2 million citizens each consume an average of 5 kilograms of uncooked rice monthly, or 60 kilograms per year.
Cuban citizens receive monthly allocations of rice on their government-issued ration cards which they can purchase at subsidized prices.
Juventud Rebelde emphasized that half the local demand for rice is met by purchases in foreign markets, and thus several of the country’s institutions have been mobilized to “consolidate” a program to increase its cultivation using some 50 varieties of the grain that can be grown in the island’s different ecosystems for maximum output.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE!
http://en.mercopress.com/2011/.....er-vietnam
Diciembre 28th, 2012 at 00:49
U.S.-CUBA TRADE AND ECONOMIC COUNCIL, INC.
ECONOMIC EYE ON CUBA- February 2012 - Report For Calendar Year 2011
2011-2001 U.S. EXPORT STATISTICS FOR CUBA
The following is the data for exports from the United States to the Republic of Cuba relating to the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act (TSRA) of 2000, which re-authorized the direct commercial (on a cash basis) export of food products (including branded food products) and agricultural products (commodities) from the United States to the Republic of Cuba, irrespective of purpose. The TSRA does not include healthcare products, which remain authorized by the Cuban Democracy Act (CDA) of 1992.
The data represents the U.S. Dollar value of product exported from the United States to the Republic of Cuba under the auspice of TSRA. The data does not include transportation charges, bank charges, or other costs associated with exports from the United States to the Republic of Cuba. The government of the Republic of Cuba reports data that, according to the government of the Republic of Cuba, includes transportation charges, bank charges, and other costs. However, the government of the Republic of Cuba has not provided verifiable data. The use of trade data reported by the government of the Republic of Cuba is suspect. The government of the Republic of Cuba has been asked to provide verifiable data, but has not.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE REPORT!
http://www.cubatrade.org/CubaExportStats.pdf
Diciembre 27th, 2012 at 17:36
What Cuba needs is a true free market, it’s insane that food is purchased by a ‘ministry’. Let the bodegeros and restaurant owners decide who they purchase from. I commend you for your courage in posting this, and keep fighting the good fight sister! I was fortunate my parents got me out of the island when I was ten, I cannot even imagine what the people who stayed behind go through every day.