The Cuban Government indefinitely extended the exemption from the Customs Tax for the import of inputs intended for production processes, a measure that benefits more than a hundred state and non-state entities and that already made it cheaper in 2025 to import sugar, animal feed, wheat flour, edible fats and beans.
The measure, disseminated by the Cuban News Agencyis taken in the middle of the US oil siege of Cubawhich has taken the paralysis of the island’s economic activity to the extreme, with the reduction of public services to maintain only essential activities in sectors such as health, water service and defense.
Resolution No. 21, signed on February 3, 2026 by the Minister of Finance and Prices and published this Tuesday in the Official Gazette No. 20extends a benefit that has been in force since November 2024 (Resolution 329) and covers more than 230 tariff subheadings.
According to the Ministry itself, the main products imported under this exemption last year were sugar, animal feed, wheat flour, edible fats and beans, many of them marketed by the private sector.
The exemption, which is applied ex officio with a view to eliminating additional procedures for importers who meet the conditions, seeks to reduce production costs and contribute to containing the final prices of food and essential goods in the midst of the economic crisis that the country is going through.
Until conditions “permit”
This extension is added to the postponement in January of the exemption from payment of tariffs on non-commercial food importsmedicines, hygiene products and medical supplies.
As now, the tariff benefits will be maintained “as long as the conditions that have determined their approval persist,” without establishing a specific deadline for their validity. The resolution came into force on February 1.
The measure authorizes, exceptionally, the importation without value limits and exempt from Customs Tax of these products when they are introduced into the country as luggage accompanied by passengers. In the case of unaccompanied luggage, importation is allowed up to a limit of 500 US dollars or 50 kilograms, according to the value/weight ratio established by Customs.
For shipments made by natural persons, the customs value limit is increased from 200 to 500 US dollars, maintaining the exemption from paying the tax for the first 30 dollars or its equivalent in weight, and applying a tariff rate of 30% on the surplus. Likewise, the exempt import of food, hygiene, medicines and medical supplies is authorized for air, sea and postal shipments up to 200 dollars or 20 kilograms.
Along with this provision, the Official Gazette published other complementary regulations, including Resolution No. 10/2026 of the MFP, which extends the benefit for the non-commercial import of power plants of more than 900 watts, and Resolution No. 4/2026 of the Ministry of Public Health, which extends the exceptional authorization for the import of medicines and medical supplies, including specific medical devices and equipment.
open the doors
Although discreetly, in recent days the Government opened the door to purchase of fuels in the international market for MSMEswhich are already activating procedures based on the requirements to start imports.
Without a statement yet detailing the bulk of the relevant operations for the purchase of diesel or gasoline abroad, the MSME Sonicarpa SRL yesterday disclosed the requirements that would be required to authorize the import.
Marco Rubio on Cuba: “Opening” the economy is “a possible way to move forward”
Enterprises where fuel is a basic input are already suffering a severe impact, while transportation businesses such as boat drivers or MSMEs for interprovincial distribution of goods now see their daily operations seriously affected.
Cuba could reach “zero hour” “if by mid-March “we do not see a tanker on the horizon,” recently warned the researcher at the Energy Institute of the University of Texas.
In a change of approach with respect to previous statements about the current situation in Cuba, the Secretary of State Marco Rubio He pointed on Saturday to an economic opening as “a possible way forward” amid growing tensions between Washington and Havana.
“I think that, without a doubt, your willingness to begin to open up in this sense is a possible way forward,” Rubio assured Bloomberg when asked if there was any type of solution for the Cuban Government at a time when the Trump Administration maintains an oil blockade of the island.
“Leave aside for a moment the fact that there is no freedom of expression, no democracy, no respect for human rights. Cuba’s fundamental problem is that it has no economy, and the people who are in charge of that country, who control that country, do not know how to improve the daily lives of their people without giving up power over the sectors they control,” held.
