Madrid/Tobacco planting is complicated in Cuba as the year closes with 12,000 hectares planted throughout the country, 8,000 of them in Pinar del Río. The forecast, announced in September, was to achieve 14,620 hectares in this province and a national total of 20,000, so the result is clearly unfavorable ten days before the end of the campaign, on January 12.
José Liván Font Bravo, first vice president of the Tabacuba business group, recalled that Pinar de Río was very far from what was projected, but remained optimistic. “We had initially planned to plant a minimum amount in the month of January; but we have sufficient posture to continue this activity and reach the proposed 20,000 hectares,” he said, implying that the planting of this product, “the main exportable item of agriculture,” will be prolonged for longer, as highlighted in a note from the Cuban News Agency (ACN).
Conditions, according to the official, have changed since the forecasts were presented, and he cited the lack of power as a serious problem. “In Pinar del Río there are more than 5,000 hectares that are under electric irrigation,” he pointed out, which is why the decision has been made to prioritize some circuits in which the plantations are located.
The conditions, according to the official, have changed since the forecasts were presented, and he cited the lack of power as a serious problem.
Font Bravo vindicated the work carried out in the last four years, seeking financing and equipment so that the processes can be “ensured” with renewable energy. “We have 320 pumps that we are installing to irrigate water for crops and 1,000 that will arrive; and for the next campaign we want to cover about 10,000 hectares with photovoltaic solar panels or other roads in the country,” he added. This is intended to reduce diesel spending.
The official also pointed out that work is being done in parallel so that, in addition to providing the facilities with photovoltaic energy (120 factories and other industries have them), producers can access panels to provide electricity to their homes and land.
In September, Marino Murillo, president of the state tobacco group, inaugurated the tobacco shop in Pinar del Río: an establishment in MLC where producers could access “more than 100 supplies and products necessary to guarantee tobacco production.” In the first images, hardware store tools predominated more than other types, although users asked above all about water turbines and generating plants, but at that time only diesel ones were for sale.
The store finally provided an outlet for the large amounts of freely convertible currency that the farmers had been amassing due to the stimulus given to them after the harvest. Most lamented the lack of places to spend that money since, with dollarization, the MLC had lost much of its value and usefulness.
Now, the official recalled, “based on the new decisions of the exchange market, producers can sell MLC to the bank at the same value as the dollar, according to the floating rate (410 pesos); an economic and financial facility to face the campaign.”
The ACN note mentions the experiences of several vegueros who continue to struggle to maintain the crop, including a cooperative whose corporate purpose is not tobacco but which has decided to plant this plant to “support the work demanded by the campaign.”
The ACN note mentions the experiences of several vegueros who continue fighting to maintain the crop
Font participated in the delivery of a new batch of 150 tractors to producers and cooperatives on the Island, bringing the total to 300 that have been imported and delivered to the sector, “at the request of farmers and productive structures that decided to invest part of their income in foreign currency in the acquisition of machinery.”
The official stressed that the hundreds of millions of dollars that the sector earns each year have allowed the acquisition with its specific financing scheme and said that it is relevant that the vegueros allocate part of their profits to it. The group, he pointed out, sells the tractors at the purchase price. “We don’t earn a cent on anything we bring. What interests us is that the producers develop,” he stated, and said that it is possible to pay in two harvests if it cannot be delivered in cash.
In the year that has just begun, another 300 vehicles are expected to be imported, although a commentator from Granma He pointed out that it is irrelevant, taking into account what is produced. “If barely 16,000 hectares will be planted, more than there are so many tractors left over, there are currently more of these. Certainly by efficiently exploiting the machinery we have we should have much higher productions, but our ‘producers’, in their desire to obtain the greatest profits, decide to minimize costs, increase prices and obtain the greatest profits,” he lamented.
The Hispanic Cuban company Habanos SA announced in February the record revenue obtained in 2024, which amounted to 827 million dollars –106 million more than a year before–, which represents an increase of 14.7% in income, although Jorge Pérez Martell, commercial vice president, spoke of a growth of 16%. With these data, it can be stated that, despite everything, it is one of the few Cuban products that is currently doing well.
