Amid the food insecurity that affects millions of Cuban families, the Military Corporation promotes breakfast with malt and sandwiches.
Madrid, Spain.- In a country where thousands of families begin the day without milk, bread or coffee, the Military Corporation Cimex has launched a promotional campaign on social networks inviting Cubans to “have breakfast with malt and sandwich.”
Under the slogan “A very happy couple, a summer love”, the offer is presented as a light and romantic experience, available from 9:00 am at the Cubita Cubita of the charm store, in Camagüey. Far from causing enthusiasm, The publication He has unleashed a wave of indignation in social networks.
“What a shame! And the children and the elderly without milk! Someday they will pay so much cynicism,” “they have never been ashamed, but their cynicism is too much, a country where most, especially children, have no milk for breakfast, and these … publish things like these”; They are the type of comments read in the publication of Cimex.
The reactions do not surprise due to the social and economic context of Cuba. The image of the ideal breakfast proposed by Cimex is a mockery to the daily life of millions of Cubans who fail to cover the most basic food needs.
According to the seventh study “The State of Social Rights in Cuba”, presented in July 2023 by the Cuban Observatory of Human Rights (OCDH), the food crisis was indicated as the main problem of the country (72%), surpassing even to the blackouts and inflation. The report revealed that seven out of ten people had had to skip some food –dasayuno, lunch or dinner – due to lack of money or food. Only 15% of Cubans could make three daily meals without interruption.
While the report “in Cuba is hunger” (2024), prepared by the Food Monitor Programshows an even more bleak panorama: 29% of Cubans eat only twice a day, and 4% just once. Provinces such as Artemis, Mayabeque, Guantanamo or the island of Youth reflect the worst indices. In addition, 25% of respondents acknowledged having slept hungry for lack of food in their homes.
While food insecurity is aggravated and most struggle to get something to put on the table, the warehouses of military corporations – as Cimex – continue to offer exclusive products and breakfast inaccessible to most. The promotion has not only been interpreted as an exercise of disconnection, but also as a provocation that exposes, once again, the structural inequality and insensitivity of the economic apparatus controlled by the Armed Forces.
