Seasons of Resistance: Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in Cuba

Abstract

I. IntroductionThe collapse of trade relations between Cuba and the Soviet Unionin 1990 plunged the Cuban economy into a state of crisis known asthe "Special Period in Peacetime."n1 In the late 1980s, Cuba reliedon the Soviet Union and other members of the Council for Mutual EconomicAssistance (CMEA) for approximately 80% of its foreign trade andreceived significant subsidies from the Soviet Union in the formof preferential prices for Cuban exports. n2 The demise of the socialisttrading bloc led to a catastrophic reduction of trade with Cuba,a drop in Soviet oil deliveries, and the termination of Soviet pricesubsidies. n3 Cuba experienced severe shortages of food, fuel, fertilizer,chemicals, spare parts, and other inputs needed for agriculturaland industrial production. n4 Food imports and domestic food productionwere severely curtailed. n5 Average caloric, protein, and vitaminintake dropped by 30% from the levels achieved during the 1980s,n6 and the first signs of malnutrition appeared. n7 As one commentatorastutely observed, "food security had shown itself to be the Achilles'heel of the revolution." n8[*687] In response to the crisis, the Cuban government adjusted its methodsof agricultural production and adopted a series of measures thathave been hailed as the "greening of the revolution"n9 and as a modelof socially equitable and ecologically sustainable agriculture. n10Cuba shifted from an export-oriented, chemical-intensive agriculturaldevelopment strategy to one that promoted organic agriculture andencouraged production for the domestic market. n11Is this transformation of Cuban agriculture a transitory phenomenonor a deliberate shift in development strategy? Has Cuba broken itsdependence on the sugar monoculture and on large-scale, capital-intensiveagriculture or will this model reassert itself when the U.S. economicembargo is lifted?This Article examines the evolution of Cuban agriculture from thecolonial period to the present time through the lens of food securityand ecological sustainability in order to suggest ways that one mightbegin to answer the questions posed above. The objective of thisArticle is to provide background and context for the Cuban reformsand to illustrate the ways that development models imposed duringthe colonial period, and reinforced through international trade andinvestment, can present formidable obstacles to the achievement offood security and ecological sustainability.An analysis of the transformation of Cuban agriculture during theSpecial Period requires an understanding of the historical originsof the problems that the recent reforms were intended to address.Part II of this Article provides an overview of the development ofthe sugar monoculture from the colonial period until the years precedingthe Revolution, with an emphasis on how the sugar monoculture promotedtrade dependency, inequitable land tenure, food insecurity, and environmentaldegradation.[*688] In Part III, the inquiry shifts to agricultural policy during thefirst thirty years of the Revolution. Part III begins with a discussionof the agrarian reform undertaken by the revolutionary governmentand concludes by assessing how agricultural policy during the firstthree decades of the Cuban Revolution ameliorated or exacerbatedthe problems of trade dependency, inequitable land tenure, food insecurity,and environmental degradation. This Part concludes that Cuba, onthe eve of the Special Period, was highly trade dependent, food insecure,and ecologically compromised as a direct consequence of the export-oriented,capital-intensive model of agricultural development adopted by theCuban government.Part IV examines the economic crisis provoked by the collapse of thesocialist trading bloc in 1990 and the reforms undertaken by theCuban government in response to that crisis. During the Special Period,the Cuban government transformed the agricultural sector by breakingup many of the inefficient, unproductive state farms into a seriesof smaller cooperative farms, by authorizing the creation of farmers'markets, and by actively promoting organic and semi-organic farmingtechniques.Part V evaluates the impact of the reforms and finds that the reformshave promoted food security and ecological sustainability, and havereduced trade dependency.Part VI concludes by discussing the challenges to the consolidationand expansion of Cuba's experiment with sustainable agriculture.As agribusiness in the United States looks to Cuba for new exportmarkets, renewed trade relations between Cuba and the United Statesare on the horizon. One of the key challenges for Cuba will be tomaintain the right to adopt agricultural policies that run counterto the prevailing neoliberal model in the face of overwhelming politicaland economic pressure. The future of sustainable agriculture in Cubais, therefore, uncertain. Much will depend on the degree of understandingand support for the new agricultural development model both at thegrassroots and at the highest levels of the Cuban government, andon the ability of the Cuban government to manage the economic integrationwith the United States effectively.