| Cuba Gives State-Run Agriculture the Boot |
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| Written by Erika Fredrickson | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Monday, 24 March 2008 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Times are a changin' in Cuba. Not long ago, Envirovore gave you some insight into why Cuba stands for a model of agricultural innovation. But the centralized system has its problems including that 90% of farmable land is state-owned and much lies fallow. There are 250,000 family farms and 1,100 private cooperatives making up the final 10% of the sector. Farmers have had to sell portions of their crops to the government at fixed prices. Recently, newly positioned president, Raul Castro, announced his plan to decentralize the state-owned land and put it into local custody. The hope is that farmers will be empowered to make local decisions rather than leaving it to the state. It's being called a “revolution” in agriculture and a way to make Cuba's farming more dynamic. As long as local farmers take the reins, and as long as they stick to low-cost inputs and creative farming techniques, they should succeed. If however, Cuba goes back to pre-Cold War, pre-embargo usage of pesticides and monocropping this could be the end of their stature as a beacon for smart cultivation. Castro says he wants to meet the needs of the Cuba people. Hopefully he knows that means not tossing Cuban farmers to the global sharks of agriculture by becoming an export economy. Source: Guardian UK
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It's true what our moms said...we are what we eat. In fact, it's truer than they thought. What I eat doesn't just affect me anymore, it affects all of us.
Unfortunately, the story of food can sometimes be complicated. But envirovores help each other out...which is why this blog will be bringing you news, tips, and information about food and the environment every step of the way.
