Cuba's sustainable agriculture at risk in U.S. thaw
Cuba’s sustainable agriculture at risk in U.S. thawMarch 25, 2016 8.39pm AEDT
Author
Miguel Altieri
Professor of Agroecology, University of California, Berkeley
Disclosure statement
Miguel Altieri does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Partners
University of California provides funding as a founding partner of The Conversation US.
View all partnersRepublish this article
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under Creative Commons licence.
Organic farm, Alamar. Melanie Lukesh Reed/Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND
Email
Twitter393
Facebook8.2k
LinkedIn
Print
President Obama’s trip to Cuba this week accelerated the warming of U.S.-Cuban relations. Many people in both countries believe that normalizing relations will spur investment that can help Cuba develop its economy and improve life for its citizens.
But in agriculture, U.S. investment could cause harm instead.
For the past 35 years I have studied agroecology in most countries in Central and South America. Agroecology is an approach to farming that developed in the late 1970s in Latin America as a reaction against the top-down, technology-intensive and environmentally destructive strategythat characterizes modern industrial agriculture. It encourages local production by small-scale farmers, using sustainable strategies and combining Western knowledge with traditional expertise.
Cuba took this approach out of necessity when its economic partner, the Soviet bloc, dissolved in the early 1990s. As a result, Cuban farming has become a leading example of ecological agriculture.
But if relations with U.S. agribusiness companies are not managed carefully, Cuba could revert to an industrial approach that relies on mechanization, transgenic crops and agrochemicals, rolling back the revolutionary gains that its campesinos have achieved.
The shift to peasant agroecology
For several decades after Cuba’s 1959 revolution, socialist bloc countries accounted for nearly all of its foreign trade.
The government devoted 30 percent of agricultural land to sugarcane for export, while importing 57 percent of Cuba’s food supply. Farmers relied on tractors, massive amounts of pesticide and fertilizer inputs, all supplied by Soviet bloc countries. By the 1980s agricultural pests were increasing, soil quality was degrading and yields of some key crops like rice had begun to decline.
When Cuban trade with the Soviet bloc ended in the early 1990s, food production collapsed due to the loss of imported fertilizers, pesticides, tractors and petroleum. The situation was so bad that Cuba posted the worst growth in per capita food production in all of Latin America and the Caribbean.
But then farmers started adopting agroecological techniques, with support from Cuban scientists.
Thousands of oxen replaced tractors that could not function due to lack of petroleum and spare parts. Farmers substituted green manures for chemical fertilizers and artisanally produced biopesticides for insecticides. At the same time, Cuban policymakers adopted a range of agrarian reform and decentralization policies that encouraged forms of production where groups of farmers grow and market their produce collectively.
Havana market. Julia Dorofeeva/Shutterstock
As Cuba reoriented its agriculture to depend less on imported chemical inputs and imported equipment, food production rebounded. From 1996 though 2005, per capita food production in Cuba increased by 4.2 percent yearly during a period when production was stagnant across Latin America and the Caribbean.
In the mid-2000s, the Ministry of Agriculture dismantled all “inefficient state companies” and government-owned farms, endorsed the creation of 2,600 new small urban and suburban farms, and allowed farming on some three million hectares of unused state lands.
Urban gardens, which first sprang up during the economic crisis of the early 1990s, have developed into an important food source.
Today Cuba has 383,000 urban farms, covering 50,000 hectares of otherwise unused land and producing more than 1.5 million tons of vegetables. The most productive urban farms yield up to 20 kg of food per square meter, the highest rate in the world, using no synthetic chemicals. Urban farms supply 50 to 70 percent or more of all the fresh vegetables consumed in cities such as Havana and Villa Clara.
The risks of opening up
Now Cuba’s agriculture system is under increasing pressure to deliver harvests for export and for Cuba’s burgeoning tourist markets. Part of the production is shifting away from feeding local and regional markets, and increasingly focusing on feeding tourists and producing organic tropical products for export.
President Obama hopes to open the door for U.S. businesses to sell goods to Cuba. In Havana last Monday during Obama’s visit, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack signed an agreement with his Cuban counterpart, Agriculture Minister Gustavo Rodriguez Rollero, to promote sharing of ideas and research.
“U.S. producers are eager to help meet Cuba’s need for healthy, safe, nutritious food,” Vilsack said. The U.S. Agriculture Coalition for Cuba, which was launched in 2014 to lobby for an end to the U.S.-Cuba trade embargo, includes more than 100 agricultural companies and trade groups. Analysts estimate that U.S. agricultural exports to Cuba could reach US$1.2 billion if remaining regulations are relaxed and trade barriers are lifted, a market that U.S. agribusiness wants to capture.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Alabama Congresswoman Terri Sewell tour a Havana farmers’ market, November 2015. US Department of Agriculture/Flickr, CC BY
When agribusinesses invest in developing countries, they seek economies of scale. This encourages concentration of land in the hands of a few corporations and standardization of small-scale production systems. In turn, these changes force small farmers off of their lands and lead to the abandonment of local crops and traditional farming ways. The expansion of transgenic crops and agrofuels in Brazil, Paraguay and Bolivia since the 1990s are examples of this process.
If U.S. industrial agriculture expands into Cuba, there is a risk that it could destroy the complex social network of agroecological small farms that more than 300,000 campesinos have built up over the past several decades through farmer-to-farmer horizontal exchanges of knowledge.
This would reduce the diversity of crops that Cuba produces and harm local economies and food security. If large businesses displace small-scale farmers, agriculture will move toward export crops, increasing the ranks of unemployed. There is nothing wrong with small farmers capturing a share of export markets, as long as it does not mean neglecting their roles as local food producers. The Cuban government thus will have to protect campesinos by not importing food products that peasants produce.
Cuba still imports some of its food, including U.S. products such as poultry and soybean meal. Since agricultural sales to Cuba were legalized in 2000, U.S. agricultural exports have totaled about $5 billion. However, yearly sales have fallen from a high of $658 million in 2008 to $300 million in 2014.
U.S. companies would like to regain some of the market share that they have lost to the European Union and Brazil.
There is broad debate over how heavily Cuba relies on imports to feed its population: the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that imports make up 60 to 80 percent of Cubans’ caloric intake, but other assessments are much lower.
In fact, Cuba has the potential to produce enough food with agroecological methods to feed its 11 million inhabitants. Cuba has about six million hectares of fairly level land and another million gently sloping hectares that can be used for cropping. More than half of this land remains uncultivated, and the productivity of both land and labor, as well as the efficiency of resource use, in the rest of this farm area are still low.
We have calculated that if all peasant farms and cooperatives adopted diversified agroecological designs, Cuba would be able to produce enough to feed its population, supply food to the tourist industry and even export some food to help generate foreign currency.
President Raul Castro has stated that while opening relations with the U.S. has some benefits,
We will not renounce our ideals of independence and social justice, or surrender even a single one of our principles, or concede a millimeter in the defense of our national sovereignty. We have won this sovereign right with great sacrifices and at the cost of great risks.
Cuba’s small farmers control only 25 percent of the nation’s agricultural land but produce over 65 percent of the country’s food, contributing significantly to the island’s sovereignity. Their agroecological achievements represent a true legacy of Cuba’s revolution.
Agriculture
Cuba
Organic farming
Tweet
Share
Get newsletter
The Conversation is a non-profit + your donation is tax deductible. Help knowledge-based, ethical journalism today.
Make a donation
You might also like
Here’s what better relations with the US mean for city farms in Cuba
After the handshake, Cuba has lots to do to normalize relations
As Obama makes historic visit, is Cuba ready for change?
How low-tech farming innovations can make African farmers climate-resilient
Sign in to comment
28Comments
Oldest Newest
John Doyle
logged in via Facebook
It’s absolutely essential that the US agricultural model is not allowed to supplant the indigenous Cuban one. Since subsidised agricultural exports from the US are geared to undercut local production, the local system will be bankrupted. It is seen in many nations from Mexico to Kenya. It’s a vicious form of colonialism.
Imagine all Cuba’s progress since 1959 being swallowed up in a few years.You can rest assured the US will be all too ready to scalp Cuba.
I have said in TC before Cuba is monetary sovereign.This means it can fund its development indigenously at no cost by paying for works directly through their central bank. Under NO circumstances should Cuba take out any loans in any foreign currency! Cuba has full control of its own currency, but none over dollars ,euros etc.
Make sure your leaders are not lead by the nose to ruin Cuba’s advantages.They will be inexperienced but a few principls if adhered to should help avoid pitfalls. I am not hopeful but I would like to hope Cuba can steer a path to it’s future free of colonial risks.Read more
3 years ago
Report
Terrence Treft
In reply to John Doyle
hear, hear!
3 years ago
Report
G Wang
logged in via GoogleIn reply to John Doyle
I agree almost 100% with everything in this post. Please, Cuba, DON’T let American agribusiness take over your ways of food production. It will be the greatest tragedy possible if that happens.
3 years ago
Report
Robert J Kolker
Robert J Kolker is a Friend of The Conversation
In reply to John Doyle
It is not colonialism. It is business competition. Lets see which model wins out in the market place.
No doubt if the Cuban granola and chicken-poop model fails, the U.S (as usual) will be blamed. The U.S. is always to blame. That is the price we pay for succeeding where others fail.
2 years ago
Report
Larry press
logged in via Google
A prominent Cuban roboticist wants to build autonomous machines to sow and harvest seeds:https://cachivachemedia.com/robots-made-in-cuba-d21ce5cd134e#.vthhvexs4I wonder whether he is designing with large corporate farms or those of 300,000 campesinos in mind. I suspect the latter.
3 years ago
Report
This comment has been automatically flagged for inspection by a moderator.
Darryl Reynolds
As a farmer, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for my Cuban counterparts when we visited. They are subsistence at best. They are forced to sell 80% of their production to the government so they focus most of their efforts on the 20% they can sell themselves. The lowest quality and poorest production goes to the government. They have learned to survive with very little and at least are no longer starving as they were in the 90’s. The market is much to small to be of much interest to most companies and is still a communist controlled totalitarian state. It is a lessen in survival and determination. Nothing more.
3 years ago
Report
Will Hunt
In reply to Darryl Reynolds
Yep, a farmer friend of ours was in Cuba last month and said it was the pits. He said 40% of their best land was completely covered in El Marabú or Marabou weed (Dichrostachys cinerea) which was out of control and they have nothing that works on it.
If they were to “revert to an industrial approach that relies on mechanization, transgenic crops and agrochemicals, rolling back the revolutionary gains that its campesinos have achieved” they might be able to get on top of it.
3 years ago
Report
Kevin Franck
logged in via GoogleIn reply to Darryl Reynolds
As an American farmer, I hope you’ve taken some notes. I find these peasant farmers to be the mirror image of earlier American Farmers who were more inventive and creative and not blindly dependent on Gov and Coprations
3 years ago
Report
Chuck Burks
logged in via Facebook
Easy for a well-paid UC Berkely professor to sing the praises of peasant agriculture. After all, he doesn’t actually have to grow his own food. His oppulent pay makes it easy for him to by “fair trade” items, even at Bay Area prices. But one wonders how many of those Cuban peasant farmers, if given a chance, would bolt to the U.S. or any of a slough of other countries.
3 years ago
Report
Tim Chambers
logged in via Google
It is also certain that the food they produce with agroecological methods is much more nutritious than that produced by Green Revolution methods 60 years on, which no doubt accounts for much of the obesity in this world. Food grown in dead soil simply doesn’t have the nutrients needed to satisfy normal dietary requirements for vitamins and minerals. So people keep eating more of it and consume to many calories. The U.S. is the most obese nation in the world. India, which adopted American agricultural practices in a big way in the 1960s is third in obesity. Gee, I wonder why.
3 years ago
Report
Will Hunt
In reply to Tim Chambers
Oh so obesity is the farmers fault then Tim? And here’s me thinking it was inactive people spending their life in front of keyboards, TVs and steering wheels.
3 years ago
Report
Tim Chambers
logged in via GoogleIn reply to Will Hunt
What are you being so defensive about? Did I say it was the farmers' fault? I didn’t even use the word. It is the fault of a methodology promoted by schools of agriculture, chemical companies, and others with an interest in maximizing yields and/or profits. The consequences were unintended and possibly unforeseen.
Obesity is a problem worldwide, not just in the United States. It often coincides with malnutrition, and not necessarily with sitting all day on one’s haunches. The fault lies in the food we eat, and the methods used to raise it. Some farmers are beginning to recognize that and finding better ways to raise healthier and more nutritious crops by reinvigorating their soils and adopting ecologically sustainable methods.
3 years ago
Report
Na Tran
In reply to Tim Chambers
It is also certain that the food they produce with agroecological methods is much more nutritious than that produced by Green Revolution methods 60 years on …
You are entitled to your own opinion but not your own facts. Much to the annoyance of the alternative food crowd, nearly every test has found at most only trivial differences in nutrition levels based on farming method.
…. which no doubt accounts for much of the obesity in this world.
Another false claim. The Green Revolution preceded the modern increase in obesity by decades and many folk who eat only conventional produce are not obese.
The U.S. is the most obese nation in the world.
Too many cheap calories from fats and sugars, not enough exercise. Not sure how “agriculture” is to blame.
India, which adopted American agricultural practices in a big way in the 1960s is third in obesity.
Only in gross numbers. Per capita India is not even in the top 40 according to the OECD countries rankings report. http://www.oecd.org/health/Obesity-Update-2014.pdf
Gee, I wonder why some people just make things upRead more
3 years ago
Report
Na Tran
In reply to Tim Chambers
You say you aren’t blaming farmers then say:
The fault lies in the food we eat, and the methods used to raise it.
Since the farmer is responsible for the “method” you are blaming farmers. I also find your claim that “reinvigorated soil” has anything to do with obesity somewhat mirth inducing.
3 years ago
Report
Kevin Franck
logged in via GoogleIn reply to Na Tran
Do you just go around looking for a comment that you can through trash at ? Almost every post in your history shows signs of deep seated anger within and the need to blame others because you possibly got the shaft every in life. Why is that someone else’s fault ? I noticed your other comments just get deleted.
3 years ago
Report
Na Tran
In reply to Kevin Franck
Not really, buddy. I’m guessing you are in the organic industry and I must admit I do despise that industry and its ill-informed vocal supporters for the obvious reason that they are part of an anti-biotech propaganda war that is already undermining global food security. Hunger is worth getting worked up about.
3 years ago
Report
Tim Chambers
logged in via GoogleIn reply to Kevin Franck
If he wants to shill for a Biotech industry that makes its money by patenting mule seeds as a means to transfer wealth from farmers to Wall Street investors, or is paid to do so, which is probably the case, your admonitions won’t stop him.
I don’t let him bother me. Neither should you.
3 years ago
Report
Na Tran
In reply to Tim Chambers
No, I do not get paid to comment. Is Big Organic paying you?
I see you’ve also made the bizarre claim that GM may be the cause of the microcephaly epidemic in Brazil. Good for you. The world of facts and reality are not for everyone.
3 years ago
Report
mem_somerville
logged in via Twitter
My twitter feed was very interested in these “artisanally produced biopesticides”. Do you have more information on those?
I know that Cuban scientists were working hard on sustainability solutions. They developed their own Bt corn to fight their pests. They had a fast-growing GMO tilapia in the 1990s! https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10373604
I hope that these terrific researchers get connected with the wider scientific community to get the credit they deserve, too.
3 years ago
Report
Na Tran
The Cuban government thus will have to protect campesinos by not importing food products that peasants produce.
You want to stop non-farmers from accessing low cost imported food because you think it is important to maintain a perpetual class of impoverished peasants? That sounds like the ultimate lose-lose to me.
3 years ago
Report
John Doyle
logged in via FacebookIn reply to Na Tran
No , not at all. American agricultural produce is sold at below its cost to produce. Multibillion subsidies keep US farmers in work. No matter how efficient, or not, the locals are they cannot compete with dumped produce. The US has a Mexican problem because after NAFTA came into force Mexican agriculture was trashed by imports, so the farmers crossed the border looking for work.The ultimate lose-lose is to adopt your attitude.
3 years ago
Report
musings o'hara
logged in via Google
I’ll bet they have a lot less Type 2 diabetes there, too. I understand there are many people around the world trying to introduce sustainable agriculture into their own domains. Prince Charles for instance asserts that he is using such methods on his own properties and touting it for the rest of Britain. Why should Cuba not host people who have this angle on things (not necessarily Charles, but perhaps)? I would imagine that everyone can learn from the Cubans and rather than be on the receiving end of subsidies and false largesse, perhaps they could lead.
Recently saw a clip on the gorgeous coral reefs in the area, which used to be more widespread in the Caribbean, but which have been killed partly by the tourist trade and hotels. It now seems that sustainable hotel accommodation is on the table too, with the new air bnb movement. Perhaps again, Cuba could say no to those who want to plant their brand in their soil, in favor of smaller and less harmful ventures. It could be a thing for someone who wants to develop to stay small.Read more
3 years ago
Report
Miguel Altieri
Professor of Agroecology, University of California, BerkeleyIn reply to musings o'hara
now US companies want to keep Cuba organic to feed the elites of US…same export model that will have same consequences that I described in paperhttps://www.politicopro.com/home
3 years ago
Report
sandeep banerjee
logged in via Google
Most probably in the late 1990s an article was published in the Monthly Review narrating the difficult and painful transition of Cuban agriculture towards organic/natural agriculture from chemical agriculture of “green revolution” type (Soviet variety). It was then a compulsion triggered by collapse of the USSR. I shall be much obliged and helped if the present author and/or readers kindly suggest a reading list on this area.
You mentioned another intriguing aspect of Cuban agriculture in the 2012 January issue of Monthly Review; that was regarding GM crops [The Paradox of Cuban Agriculture]. Does this new relation with the USA pose any change in this aspect, suppose towards acceleration or increase?Thanking you
3 years ago
Report
Mer Frazer
logged in via Facebook
This is so sadly predictable. And I have at least some empathetic grasp of the fact that for Cubans who want their isolation with the US ended this ‘opening’ is good news, but it is clear that within a decade they will rue the day. Cuba and its unique sense of community, with all its deprivations and fault lines ( which are of course in all societies if one looks hard enough) will be a distant and dare I say beautiful memory compared with the corporate take over that has already begun.
The US , already in a profound and ever spirally downward decline, should be learning how to cope from Cuba- not the other way around……
3 years ago
Report
Robert J Kolker
Robert J Kolker is a Friend of The Conversation
To anyone who knows the answer:
How well are the Cubans eating these days?
2 years ago
Report
ronald g davis
In reply to Robert J Kolker
From my direct experience in the last year/two the Cubans I have seen and met are not starving. If one looks at the images carefully even on websites you might notice the size of the people – not the 3 million tourists – but the Cubans –wide and a few looking obese. In addition it would behoove those skimming Altieri’s essay to take a second reading and respect his data/facts sincehe has described the matter of agro ecological that is organic farmers producing enormous amounts of food that the USDA lies about in order to prove the Cubans are in need of US shipments of food to save their lives. They already import US GMO grain from the Midwest. They also import some food from Argentina and Brazil – imagine there are other countries that produce food and have trade with Cuba. Brazil big time! [China, Russia. France, Japan] The Cubans import stuff that is difficult to grow in tropical climates. Urban farms & gardens in Havana cannot use –pesticides. Banned!The organic food movement Altieri notes was pumped into practice when the Soviets couldn’t support Cuban big Ag. There is some evidence that organic food production started before 1989.
The agricultural statistics are a jumble unless you sort them out from the US propaganda to the Cuban defensiveness against distortions.
RgDavisPhDRead more
2 years ago
Report
Most popular on The Conversation
View from The Hill: Morrison goes a bridge too far to outsmart Shorten
Grattan on Friday: Unions likely to be more challenging for a Shorten government than boats
Having a second child worsens parents’ mental health: new research
Curious Kids: Why don’t dogs live as long as humans?
Designing cities to counter loneliness? Let’s explore the possibilities
Why the public isn’t allowed to know specifics about the George Pell case- How low will Bitcoin now go? The history of price bubbles provides some clues
- We have a Christmas comet: how to
Spirituality, Mind-Body, Gender, Ecology, Ageing, Peace, Scrapbook (in English and Korean)
