Marc Frank

HAVANA, Reuters – According to media reports, the Cuban sugar industry continues to slide towards its worst ever season, threatening both economic growth and national pride.

According to two sugar experts in the area and official data, 2022’s harvest will be significantly lower than last year. At the moment, it is at least 30% short of the communist government’s target of 900,000. tonnes.

Last year’s harvest of 800,000 tons was just 10% below the 1989 peak of 8,000,000 tonnes.

Cuba was once proud of its sugar industry, which drove foreign trade and created jobs in the country’s vast rural areas.

Due to the new tough U.S. sanctions as well as the pandemic coronavirus, the government was unable to fund the sector’s financial needs.

“The government will have to import and maybe cut the sugar quota on the monthly food ration. The bakeries will have to scramble to make sweets,” said one sugar expert consulted by Reuters, who asked to remain anonymous because he was not authorized to speak with foreign journalists.

To meet the government’s goal of 4% annual growth, they had expected a slight increase in sugar production. This was after the economy shrank by more than 11% in 2020. It grew only 2% in 2017, which reduced resources for plantations and mills.

Salvador Valdes Mesa (Vice President) toured the country to urge cane cutters and mill workers to increase their production in a bid for revival of this once-famous sector.

Harvest typically begins in November and continues into May. But this year, most mills opened in December/early January due to a shortage of spare parts.

According to a local expert in sugar, “They won’t recover the lost tonnes and they will likely fall further behind due to the structural and long-standing problems.”

Numerous reports from Granma, the official Communist Party newspaper, showed that key sugar-producing regions, such as Villa Clara and Las Tunas, were well behind their production targets.

Local sources and reports also indicated that production at Cuba’s 35 sugar mills fell short of schedule.

Cuba had set aside 500,000 tonnes of sugar for its domestic consumption in this year’s budget and was planning to export China 400,000 tonnes under a stand-alone agreement.