Brazil’s president, Dilma Rousseff, invited to the 2nd Summit of CELAC, will accompany Raul Castro on Monday in the opening of the new container terminal. Rousseff and Castro will not be simply opening the doors of a new marine facility, but they will also premiere a chapter in Cuban economic history, at just few months after the entry into force of a law on foreign investment that will be discussed and approved in extraordinary circumstances. El Mariel is a bet towards a somewhat uncertain future because all the investment is thought for the time in which USA and Cuba to fully resume their economic relations. The expansion and modernization of the port has cost Brazil over 640 million dollars. The work has been developed by the Revolutionary Armed Forces Construction Company and Odebrecth Corporation. The progress of its construction had a high-level monitoring, in which Raúl Castro was directly and publicly involved. The Special Development Zone, accompanying port, aims to be the basis for a new wave of foreign investment in Cuba. It will also function as a giant storage center and regional marine cargo handling. To attract entrepreneurs, the Cuban State Council approved a special tax regime, which reduces...

Saying that monetary duality will celebrate its centenary in 2014 might seem like a bad joke or madness. But in reviewing the history of Cuba, it can be checked that its origins is much before the Special Period. On December 28, 1898 , the then President of the United States, William McKinley, decreed by means of an executive order the use of dollar as legal currency in Cuba, also setting exchange rates against the Spanish and French currencies circulating in the Island. Three days later, on January 1st, 1899, the American money went into Cuba almost by force, along with U.S. soldiers of the first military intervention in the island. A new government landed with its new money. Through this decree , McKinley ordered a new financial regulation in Cuba, devaluating currencies historically circulating in the former Spanish colony and facilitating the use of U.S. dollar, according to the interpretation of the Presidential Decree 123 of 1989 made by the Cuban historian Concepción Planos Viñals. Cuban peso does not yet exist and the salaries were paid in French and Spanish currency. U.S. currency entered and resulted in a quite uncomfortable financial menage à trois which even provoked strikes (in 1907,...

"In Cuba interesting facts are taking place, and it is time that the EU upgrades its relations with the island." The Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, Frans Timmermans, made this statement to the Vice-president Ricardo Cabrisas , one of the top Cuban officials that received him during his working visit to Havana. Regarding economic reforms, he said that "these positive developments deserve our attention.” Another time he added. "It think it's time for Europe to revise its position on Cuba and negotiate a new stance” That a foreign minister of the 28 say this has implications. The arrival in Havana of a Dutch foreign minister is an event of high caliber in foreign policy. The European Union has a common position towards Cuba, which conditions any progress in relations with the island to the realization of internal changes. This regional approach was adopted in 1996, in return for the suspension of Title III of the Helms- Burton Call (part of the U.S. blockade), which had affected US-based European business in Cuba. Timmermans came with spirits of reconciliation. "Dialogue is the best way to work instead of turning the back on each other. " He was probably speaking not...

The government of the island said the Cuban peso (CUP) will be the only currency circulating in the country, from the gradual elimination of the convertible peso (CUC), equivalent to the U.S. dollar. The vice president of the Council of Ministers Marino Murillo said during his speech on Friday, before the plenary of the National Assembly of People's Power, that the program for monetary and exchange rate unification had ended, which allow the Cuban peso to be the sole currency in the country, though he didn’t say when. Similarly warranties were offered for those who have funds and bank accounts in CUC and he confirmed that it will keep its financial capacity. He said that the monetary union will not be a shock therapy, but not by itself will solve the economic problems of the country. "Anyone with Cuban convertible peso (CUC), kept both in banks and in the house, will not lose its financial capacity when dual currency is removed," the official said according to a report from Radio Reloj, major radio station in the island The announcement of the launch of a "schedule" to eliminate the dual currency prevailing in the island since the 90s of last century,...

The Cuban convertible peso meets this December 20, 19 years in circulation. This, perhaps, is his last birthday. CUC (for its acronym in English Cuban Convertible) was born by decree of Hector Rodriguez Llompart, former Minister-President of the now defunct National Bank of Cuba. Its birth certificate was resolution 357 of that institution. It was the winter of 1994 and the Cubans left behind one of the worst years of the crisis dubbed the Special Period. As a currency, its mission was "to be used in commercial transactions made on the premises duly authorized to operate in freely convertible currency" and serve "for the payment to be made by institutions authorized by the Government to implement the system of stimulation in cash in freely convertible currency for their workers.” The convertible peso had a "marginal child". Even it didn’t have an original design on the reverse of each of its bills. For a decade, it circulated with the same picture repeated on both sidea: the Cuban national coat-of-arms. About to turn ten, another resolution of the Central Bank of Cuba determined the replacement of all U.S. dollars for convertible pesos: a decision that changed the view that the Cuban population...

One hundred eighty-four thousand Cubans traveled outside of Cuba during the first eleven months of 2013, thanks to immigration reform enactment earlier this year. That is the figure that Cuba’s Interior Ministry (MININT) handles, accounting for departures occurred between January 14 and November 302013 . Some have mounted more than once on the plane, as the authorities have recorded 258,518 trips. Sixty-six thousand people went to the United States, out of which 40,000 have not yet returned. Contrary to what one might expect, most travelers didn’t go to the Northern Country: 118,000 went to other countries, out of which about 62 thousand, 52%, did not return In total, since 2013, some 110,000 Cubans already threaten to be part permanently of the Cuban communities abroad. These accurate figures were given by Colonel Lamberto Fraga, deputy chief of the Directorate of Immigration of MININT, to a crew of the Cuba Today , a YouTube channel which publishes reports on the reality of the Island In the interview, Fraga explained why some travelers have not yet decided to extend their stay in Miami or anywhere in the U.S. geography. "We have estimated (we believe) that many Cubans when entering the United States are...

Neither Cuba’s nor the United States presidents have made comments about the words exchanged during the memorial of Nelson Mandela at Soccer City in Johannesburg, South Africa. Former Cuban President Fidel Castro must have felt much curiosity as any of the millions who viewed the greeting on live television. The advantage, over those millions, is that he is the brother of one of those involved in the so-called historic handshake. Therefore, he could publish an article mentioning the episode. "Mister President, I'm Castro" was the last thing Raul told Obama, to keep him for a few seconds, to which Obama responded by nodding. If queried this video, between the second 27 and 29, the Cuban president is voicing something similar to the word "Castro." Fidel wrote an article entitled "Mandela is dead Why hide the truth about Apartheid?” and it reads as follows: "The role of the delegation of Cuba, on the death of our brother and friend Nelson Mandela, will be unforgettable. I congratulate comrade Raúl for his brilliant performance and, especially, by the firmness and dignity when with friendly but firm gesture greeted the head of government of the United States and said in English: "Mr. President, I'm...

Barack Obama himself has not spoken out about the much publicized salute to Cuban President Raul Castro. But its spokesmen told the U.S. version of events ... giving signs of what governments talk about, but no hints of what their heads of state said. "The president shook hands with those who were on the stand and Mr. Castro was one of those who were there." That was the justification given to the press by Josh Earnest, a spokesman for the White House. It is still a mystery what was said during the seven seconds it takes the salute, which ended with a word or two by Raul, to which Obama responded with a nod, a gesture later repeated by Castro himself.... Earnest was not sure of the content of the conversation. "I understand, by reference of people who spoke to the president after the speech, they did not have a substantial conversation about politics, but rather exchanged some compliments as the president headed for the podium." What is known is what they did not speak about. "The president was not able to tell directly, as it has done on several occasions, that Alan Gross should be released," Earnest said. He...

Raul Castro doesn’t appear to be particularly amazed by having greeted Obama, or at least that is the impression he conveyed to journalists of Colombia’s RNC, who asked him about the topic, when they made him "an interview without permission," according to the Cuban president himself. When they told him his photo with Obama was going around the world, Raúl did not seem to give it much importance, with "I have been told something like that" he said jokingly. "OK, we are civilized people. If you read my speech, did you see it? It addresses that. " Raul Castro's speech at the ceremony in memory of Nelson Mandela recalled the l anti-apartheid eader’s effort to build a country that overcame the adversity of racism. "Nelson Mandela will not go down in history for the 27 consecutive years he lived there in jail and never gave up his ideas; he will go because he was able to remove from his soul all the poison that could create so unfair punishment; for the generosity and wisdom that in the hour of unstoppable victory he knew so brilliantly direct his selfless and heroic people, knowing that the new South Africa could never be...

Like many other Galicians, Alberto Nunez Feijoo seems to have come to Havana for economic reasons. This conservative politician, president of the regional government of the Spanish region of Galicia, came to visit Cuba in the second decade of the century, a hundred years after the time when the grandparents of those governed by him migrated to Cuba in search of a job. For that reason he traveled to Havana with his conselleiro (minister) of Economy and Industry, Francisco Conde, who will remain in Havana a day longer than his boss "to meet with several Cuban officials in the areas of agriculture, industry, energy and mining " Diary of Galicia told its readers. Furthermore, Feijoo landed escorted by twenty entrepreneurs in a country that is sending abroad signals openness to foreign capital and its carriers. But the crisis has had an effect on the Spanish-Cuban economic relations. At least in tourism, the number of Spanish visitors has fallen by about 44% in the past six years. Cuba has always been a stronghold for the Spanish market economy abroad. And the Galician President was explicit: Núñez Feijoo believe his people should "be present in this new scenario of updating economic policies."...

Sunday 8th there will not be theater, music and film shows. The government of Cuba declared National Mourning for that day, after two days of official mourning. The entire island will be in silence, and Havana also, even though it is through the International Festival of New Latin American Cinema. In Cuba, Mandela's name carries weight. Anywhere in the world, the name of Madiba is synonymous with the struggle for democracy and against apartheid. But this island is a little different. In Cuba, apartheid was also an enemy; South Africa is not a distant point on the map. During the 70s and 80s, hundreds of thousands of Cubans crossed the Atlantic, landed in Angola, and remained there until the white government of South Africa had to undertake not to get on the ground and in the affairs of the former Portuguese colony. Some people are convinced that the Cuban military presence in Angola was one of the levers that helped topple apartheid. Mandela was one of those people. When he visited Cuba in 1991, he said: "The Cuban internationalists made a contribution to the independence, freedom and justice in Africa that is unparalleled by the principles and selflessness that characterize...

On December 3, 2013, the Cuban Carlos Juan Finlay is news again, this time thanks to Google. The most widely used Internet search engine has dedicated him one of its doodles, but apparently it didn’t want to put him away from his discovery: the mosquito Aedes Aegyptis appears perched on the "g" in Google written with characters shaped as lilies. It was one of the most famous physicians of his time and probably saved millions of lives by solving the mystery of how the deadly yellow fever was transmitted. Clicking on the doodle, a page with search results for "Juan Carlos Finlay," with links to articles about the life of this scientist opens. The second "g" is replaced by an aedes aegyptis mosquito: In the upper left corner of the page, a small logo of Google, which is also modified, appears. Carlos J. Finlay should have been the first Cuban Nobel Prize. He was nominated seven times in the early years of the twentieth century, in the category of Medicine and supported by several personalities of the time. He died in 1914 without the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm given him that recognition. He was born in Camaguey province in 1833,...

One part of the experiment of removing the dual currency began years ago. As far as many economists suggest, the disappearance of the convertible peso (CUC) first passes through the unification of the two current exchange rates. This process will occur by the devaluation of the official rate (1CUC for 1CUP), to be increased to meet the rate of exchange houses, CADECAS (1CUC for 25 CUP). The disappearance of the dual currency would require a "unifying rate. " The first new exchange rate between the Cuban peso and the convertible brother is no secret, in fact was published in a special edition of the Official Gazette of the Republic, in January 2013, ten Cuban pesos per convertible peso. But it is a conversion in one direction; CUC to CUP, not the other way around. For months, there were rumors that in Cuba there were state-run enterprises working with this special rate, but they did not mention which ones or since when. From Colombia , economist Pavel Vidal , former specialist of Cuba 's Central Bank said in a Lay Space magazine interview that Resolution 9 of 2013 the Ministry of Finance established a new special exchange rate for the sale...

Streets turned into rivers, a sky increasingly gray and the collapse of a building demolished by the impact of water: on Friday November 29 it rained so much that the next day, the Granma newspaper compared Havana with Macondo, wet town in the fictional novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, by the Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez. That day, anything that happened in Havana, occurred with drops of water falling as background soundtrack. The fourth cold front of the current winter season has left much rain as a hurricane, with winds somewhat strong, 63 kilometers per hour. The clouds have released their load of water over most of the western part of Cuba, from Artemisa province to Ciego de Avila, in the center of the island “These rains are associated with the decline of nearly stationary front that has remained throughout the day with slow movement and is now on the central provinces, weakening in its southern portion, combined with an upper trough in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the which is causing atmospheric instability with strong and continuous rains, " the Center for Weather forecasts Institute says Flooding in the streets and avenues of Havana paralyzed traffic during Friday...

Sixty- seven thousand Americans traveled to Cuba between January and September 2013. The figure can be deduced from the statistics published by the National Bureau of Statistics and Information of the island, in its report published on its website. Although it did not mention how many come from U.S. territory, it did reveal the total of foreign visitors from North America, and within these, from Mexico and Canada. A simple addition and subtraction operation yields the number of Americans who came to Cuba in 2013. The ONEI does not seem interested in making it public, even though in the first nine months of 2013 American was the eighth nationality in terms of visitors, more than traditional markets like Spain or Mexico. The name of the United States of America does not appear in the monthly reports, only in the annual ones. The 67,000 American visitors the year in question represent 68 % of all U.S. visitors that arrived in Cuba in 2012, but those traveling for the last three months of the year are yet to be counted, coinciding with the end of the low season tourism in Cuba. U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry, said in November 2013 that...

Cuba's government wants to boost the sugar cane business, excited by the rise of sugar prices in international markets. Vice President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura toured during the first weeks of November several eastern and central Cuba sugar mills, urging workers and managers to produce more. But spirits are higher than the goals. Cuba intends to produce only a little more sugar in the period 2012-2013, and less than half of what was harvested during the crisis of the Special Period years. In the 2012-2013 harvest, fields and sugar mills in Cuba will give 1.8 million tons, according to estimates by the AZCUBA state corporation. No wonder there is talk of a "recovery." The Cuban sugar industry was dismantled through the so-called Álvaro Reynoso Plan, a program of reductions and reorganization that wiped a hitherto vital part of the Cuban economy. The interesting thing is that there are new players in the game: the sugar industry was opened to foreign investment. Brazilian Company of Works and Infrastructure begin running in conjunction with the AZCUBA the 5 de Septiembre Sugar mill, located in the province of Cienfuegos and nicknamed The Colossus of Rhodes. That foreign company is a subsidiary of Odebrecht,...

In XXI century’s Havana there is a great longing for the music of the sixties. A bronze John Lennon remains perpetually sitting in a park in Vedado neighborhood, while a cluster of bands make a living playing some of his hits. The rock and roll of the era of Led Zeppelin and The Doors is as lucrative as traditional Cuban music with many tourists listening to it in the streets of Old Havana . Nightclubs like the Yellow Submarine have hosted bands that can play a precise execution of Hard Day 's Night or the heavy metal version of Eleanor Rigby . Taking advantage of the custom of this booming Cuban mini - industry of Beatlemania, the Lucas Project organized a tribute to the Beatles in the Karl Marx Theater in Havana, Saturday, November 16, 2013. This, then, is the most recent example of Cuban veneration for The Beatles. A dozen musicians and bands took turns through space that one or two songs last, playing the songs of the Beatles in their style, as Ernesto Blanco did with a version of Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds between pop and rock, lacking a little the relaxed and psychedelic atmosphere of...

494 Anniversary of the former village of San Cristobal de La Habana The harbor gave birth to Havana. For the early Spanish navigators that saw it, who knew of bays and things related to boats, it seemed a particularly promising site. When Galician Sebastian Ocampo met the water inlet anchored his ships there and started “careening “, repairing the hull of his boats. Therefore, with the rush and pragmatism of those who must give a name to a site for the first time, they named the bay as Puerto Carena (Careening Port), which could have been to identify the future city , if it hadn’t prevailed the Indian word "Habana . " Without its bay and its potential port, the city of San Cristobal had not been built on its current site on November 16, 1519. It would have ended up being another city in western Cuba, raised offshore. The first capital of the island was Santiago de Cuba, where the rulers of Cuba began the colonization. Havana had to earn its position slowly. Historian Ramiro Guerra wrote that “the conquest of Mexico and the establishment of sea routes between Spain and the Indies later, forced scale ships in the...

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parilla will soon land in Havana with excellent news. His international tour in early November has had a multimillion dollar success. He will not have to break the news personally; the Mexican press reported it already: Mexico wrote off a debt of 340 million dollars lent to Cuba in 1998 . That figure is 70 % of a loan originally granted by the National Foreign Trade Bank (Bancomext). And the good news does not end there: the island will have ten years to pay the 147 million still owed to Mexico. How much is 340 million dollars to Cuba? For the sum of the writing off approximates the total value of imports from Vietnam, the main supplier of rice to Cuba . The Mexican Finance Minister, Luis Videgaray , described the former debt as " a financial problem with Cuba , a credit to the Cuban government granted by Bancomext and represents a debt of 487 million and as there has not been an agreement to pay . " Videgaray said the clean slate eliminates a diplomatic problem. "It was important to address this situation, which was an obstacle for things to be well with...

That’s right. The United States is the sixth among issuing nations of tourist to Cuba. Despite restrictions and difficulties to travel to Cuba, 98,050 US citizens visited the Caribbean island in 2012.The National Statistics and Information Office (ONEI by its acronym in Spanish) published that figure in its section on tourism in its Statistic Report for that year. The number of US visitors has doubled during the past five years: in 2007, 40,000 US travelers came to Cuba, a figure that remained stable during 2008 but from 2009 it gradually increased at a ration of 10,000 per year. In 2012 these numbers rose in 25,000 in comparison with the previous year. The number of US tourist is higher than the figures of Argentinean tourists, the main Latin American issuing nation of tourists to Cuba. In the Cuban tourist market, the United States is sixth just by a small difference –barely a few thousands– against France, Italy and Germany, which, in that order, have taken from the fifth to the third position in the list of the main issuing nations of tourists to Cuba. At the same time the number of US visitors grew, figures of European travellers decreased. Between 2007...

The restoration of Moscow -Havana old economic alliance seems to be distancing itself from a full recovery. And the news emerges when a delegation led by senior Cuban officials traveled to the capital of the tsars to talk about business with important Russian politicians such as Sergei Lavrov, Foreign Affairs Minister and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. The financial records are showing alarm signals. This was said by Cuban Minister of Foreign Trade and Foreign Investment, Rodrigo Malmierca. In a speech to the Chamber of Commerce in Russia , hecommented that trade between Russia and Cuba has decreased during the current year , according to a report by the Russian news agency RIA Novosti. Until September 2013, trade between the two countries was of $ 170 million. But this decline is not a unique situation. In previous years, economic relations between Cuba and Russia have had ups and downs. In 2009, bilateral trade decreased in 13% when compared with the previous year, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics and Information of Cuba. But Malmierca gave no signs of being discouraged. In his address to the Russian Chamber of Commerce, he stated that Russian companies are interested in investing in the Cuban energy sector, participating in the modernization of power plants and oil extraction. He also spoke of the opportunities arising in Mariel Special Development Zone. Malmierca, making a nod to the old Cold War allies , added that Mariel Zone "allows new opportunities to develop Cuba's economic ties with the world, but especially with Russia, due to the relationships the two countries have kept for years." Malmierca is in Moscow along with Vice President Ricardo Cabrisas, they both top the Cuban delegation participating in an intergovernmental commission for economic cooperation. In recent years, Russian President Vladimir Putin has...

Raul Castro offered a phone number to Barack Obama at the precise moment when he began to include in his speeches phrases like " the opportunity will do again to declare our willingness to resolve at the negotiating table the longstanding dispute between the U.S. and Cuba " or " Cuba maintains the proposal to move towards normalization of its ties with the United States and develop cooperation in all areas that can benefit both peoples.” Raul probably wanted to talk with Barack since the day that the young Illinois senator won his first four year term in the White House. In August 2009, the Cuban president told the National Assembly: " I take this opportunity to reiterate the willingness of Cuba to the United States to sustain a respectful dialogue between equals , without a shadow for our independence, sovereignty and self-determination . We are ready to talk about everything, I repeat everything, but about here, about Cuba, and about there, about the United States, not to negotiate our political and social system. " He even offered to hold a meeting at the Guantanamo Naval Base, the same piece of land that the former Cuban defense minister, now president,...

The Communist Party of Cuba replaced Granma newspaper director. Starting today or at least after the publication of the official notice, Pelayo Terry Cuervo, now former director of Juventud Rebelde newspaper, will replace Lázaro Barredo. The replacement was already made public through social media after journalists from the newspaper of general circulation in Cuba commented the news with their colleagues in other media. Not yet disclosed what will be the fate of Barredo, who as a panelist of the TV primetime show Roundtable, was one of the most visible Cuban journalists during the years of so-called Battle of Ideas, at the beginning of the last decade. Under his leadership, Granma adopted some changes, but they probably were not sufficient for his immediate superiors. Granma reporters were told that the change of director was made to "renew." According to his official biography as a parliamentarian, Lázaro Barredo entered in 1959 "to the Youth Patrol and as a teenager he joined the National Revolutionary Militia. After being demobilized from the Army Forces, he began working in 1969 in the Juventud Rebelde newspaper as a correspondent in Matanzas, and then in the former province of Oriente. He is a former deputy director of...

The line seemed endless. As in all Cuban queues, there was the second part, the continuation: the next step. You waited for a good time to buy, and then had to have the same patience to get the signature. It was not compulsory, but who could purchase the book and not put it in front of the author for him to sign an autograph? Leonardo Padura finished writing "The man who loved dogs" sometime in 2009. Four years later he continues to address the "consequences" of his latest creation, either before disciplined crowd in Vedado or in an interview with an Argentine journalist. The interest of the press, the succession of awards and formality of signing his name with that rushed calligraphy of autographs, is the reaction to a book nature of much talk and that few have read in Cuba. Getting a copy is a stroke of luck, not because of its scarcity, but in the interest of the Cuban readers, depleting any issue in the minimum time needed from learning about it and coming and buying. "The man who loved dogs" is a historical novel and its characters breathe in Havana of the seventies and eighties or Europe...

The lowest paid workers in Cuba are ... those who work in commerce, restaurants and hotels? The best salaries are ... in the construction industry? At first glance, these seem to be respectively the peaks and lowest points in the average monthly wage data by economic activity, published by the National Bureau of Statistics and Information (ONEI). As for wages by province, the highest are in Ciego de Avila, where the average wages of a worker are a little over 500 pesos. Ciego de Avila province maintains that record since 2008, when it overtook Sancti Spiritus at the first spot. The lowest wages are recorded in Santiago de Cuba and it has been like that since 2012, when the second most populous province replaced in that position Guantanamo on the wage board. However, the difference between the average salary of these territories is negligible: only one Cuban peso. Specialists from the Department of Social Statistics at ONEI argue that high wages in Ciego de Ávila are "logical, due the tourism in the Keys" in the province. As for the differences between construction and tourism, they explain that they cannot account for gratuities and other income that is well above the...