The official discourse about the participation of Cubans abroad as actors in the country’s development has for years promised progress that the legal architecture and everyday practice have repeatedly contradicted.
The result has often been disappointment, withdrawal, distrust, and wasted opportunities at the worst possible moment for the country.
When President Miguel Díaz-Canel called on March 2 to implement “urgent transformations,” he explicitly included among his priorities the “promotion of business with Cubans residing abroad.” We have been hearing the same message for years, yet with very few real results.
Cuba’s economy is experiencing its worst contraction in decades, with GDP per capita that ECLAC places at the lowest level in Latin America—even below Haiti—and with an “effective population” that no longer reaches ten million people after the most intense migration wave in its contemporary history.
Against that backdrop, the more than three million Cubans living abroad represent a strategic economic potential that the Cuban government recognizes but has yet to provide with functional and reliable rules of the game.
My experience as an entrepreneur who has spent decades trying to build bridges between the diaspora and Cuban society has allowed me to refine my views, based on practical experiences, on some of the economic decisions that must be taken without further delay in order to help rescue the country.
What Cannot Be Postponed
I have said it on many occasions, particularly after the approval of private enterprises (MIPYMES) in 2021. I said it at the Conference on the Nation and Emigration, in front of the country’s authorities: the first step must be the recognition and implementation of the right of all Cubans to create businesses in Cuba.
For those living abroad, opportunities should not exist only as investors in projects belonging to others or to the State. Entrepreneurs, by nature, want to build, manage, and assume the risk of their own projects. There is no justification for imposing such restrictions on Cubans who live outside the island.
In this same spirit, it is essential to guarantee real protection for private property. Entrepreneurs need to know that what they build, buy, or develop is protected by law and not subject to arbitrary changes. Without legal certainty there is no long-term investment. Economic confidence begins with the assurance that productive assets are protected.
Another indispensable decision is to fully open the real estate market. Today real estate development in Cuba is constrained by restrictions that prevent property accumulation and the development of large-scale urban projects.
Allowing individuals and companies to acquire multiple properties, purchase land, build buildings, and develop residential, commercial, or industrial projects would have an immediate economic impact. In every dynamic economy, the construction sector acts as a powerful multiplier of economic activity.
Access to land as an economic asset is also fundamental. This is another major change that must take place. Cuban entrepreneurs should be able to purchase land or hold transferable usage rights that can serve as financial collateral. Without access to land as a productive asset, business growth in sectors such as agriculture, industry, or tourism remains severely limited.
A fundamental step is to open foreign trade to private companies. Private enterprises should be able to import raw materials, machinery, and technology, as well as export their products directly to international markets. Dependence on state intermediaries for commercial operations increases costs and limits competitiveness.
The country must also develop a functional wholesale market. Many private businesses in Cuba struggle to obtain basic inputs and materials. A wholesale system would allow companies to access raw materials and intermediate goods efficiently and at competitive prices.
Another essential measure is opening the financial system to the private sector. Businesses need access to credit, productive financing, foreign-currency accounts, and international payment systems. Without access to capital, companies cannot expand or invest in new technologies.
It will also be necessary to radically simplify bureaucratic processes related to the creation and expansion of businesses. Starting a company, expanding operations, or making operational changes should not require long administrative procedures. Institutional efficiency is one of the basic conditions for entrepreneurial development.
Another equally important step must be added to these decisions: combating administrative corruption, favoritism, and discretionary decision-making in economic matters. When access to permits, contracts, or opportunities depends on personal relationships or informal privileges, business confidence erodes and economic development becomes distorted.
The economies that achieve sustained growth are those where rules are applied transparently and uniformly to everyone, without selective advantages or institutional arbitrariness.
These necessary changes must also address a structural issue the country will have to face: the transformation of many state enterprises that today operate with very low productivity. In numerous countries that have undergone economic reform processes, such companies have been transformed through full or partial privatization, partnerships with private capital, or worker participation in management through cooperative models.
International experience shows that such transformations can revitalize entire sectors of the economy when carried out gradually and transparently.
What China, Vietnam, and Other Countries Teach Us
China, Vietnam, and many other countries that have developed market-based economies with redistributive social policies offer interesting examples. They succeeded in transitioning from highly centralized economic systems to more dynamic and efficient models without abandoning planning or the regulatory and redistributive role of the state.
In Vietnam, the process began with the economic reforms known as Đổi Mới in the late 1980s. The Vietnamese government officially recognized multiple forms of property and allowed the creation of private enterprises. But one of the most important elements of the process was the relationship with its diaspora.
Vietnam adopted a series of concrete measures to attract Vietnamese living abroad. Laws were approved allowing them to invest in companies within the country, participate in real estate projects, and open businesses with relative ease. Mechanisms were also created to repatriate capital and transfer technology.
The government also facilitated the temporary or permanent return of emigrated professionals, encouraging their participation in strategic sectors such as technology, industry, and international trade. Many Vietnamese entrepreneurs who had built businesses in the United States, Europe, or Australia returned to invest when they perceived stable conditions.
China followed a similar strategy. A significant portion of the initial investment in its special economic zones came from Chinese entrepreneurs based in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia. These investors were among the first to bet on the country’s growth because they understood the culture, knew the market, and had emotional and cultural ties to its development.
This is a common pattern: diaspora capital often becomes one of the first engines of economic growth.
The Role of the Cuban Diaspora
Cuba holds an extraordinary advantage in this regard. The Cuban diaspora is one of the most entrepreneurial emigrant communities in the hemisphere. Hundreds of thousands of Cubans have built successful companies, developed international commercial networks, and accumulated business experience in some of the most competitive markets in the world.
This human and financial capital could play a decisive role in the country’s economic transformation if the appropriate conditions existed.
Let me repeat: Cubans living abroad must be able to invest freely, acquire property, participate in business projects, and legally protect their assets within Cuba. Mechanisms must also be facilitated to allow the transfer of capital, technology, and business knowledge.
The diaspora is not just a source of remittances. It is a community with capital, entrepreneurial experience, and access to international markets.
Many countries have discovered that the economic return of their diaspora was the first step toward a new stage of growth.
Cuba now faces that same opportunity.
At the same time, when we speak about the diaspora, we must start from a basic reality: those who return do not come back only with capital, entrepreneurial experience, or access to markets. They also return with their ideas, their convictions, and their way of seeing the world.
It is inevitable that many of those perspectives will not coincide with those of the government or with those who have lived their entire lives on the island. That should surprise no one.
In China, Vietnam, and many other places it has been demonstrated that economic development does not require uniformity of thought. It requires something much simpler—and much more difficult: mutual respect and the ability to coexist with differences while working together to rebuild a country.
Differences in perspective do not make us adversaries or enemies. They are the natural part of a nation that lives both inside and beyond its borders.
