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Thread: Coping With a Food Crisis - Cuban Style

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  1. #6
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    I will give you some real numbers from a second article published here in 2010, but to me the benefits of this system in any society, (fresh real food, employment oppurtunities for the poor, reduction in pollution, empowerment of the people, etc.) let alone in a time of food and oil shortages seem self-evident.

    In 1988, 12-13,000,000 tons of Soviet oil were imported by Cuba.
    By 1991, that promised 13,000,000 tons was reduced to 6,000,000 tons and oil shortages started to severely impact the Cuban economy.

    Before 1989, Cuba was a model Green Revolution farm economy, based on huge production units of state-owned farms, and dependent on vast quantities of imported oil, chemicals and machinery to produce export crops.
    98% of all its petroleum had come from the Soviet bloc.

    85% of all Cuba's trade was with the Soviets.
    Cuba exported 66% of all sugar and 98% of its citrus fruit to the Soviet bloc, and imported from them 66% of its food, 86% of all raw materials, and 80% of machinery and spare parts.

    In early 1990 100,000 tons of wheat normally obtained through barter arrangements failed to arrive and the government had to use scarce hard currency to import grain from Canada.
    The price of food went up and bread had to be rationed.
    Overall, food consumption was said to decrease by 20% in calories and 27% in protein between 1989 and 1992.

    The collapse of the rural economies in Cuba due to the reduction in farm activity caused an increase in migration to urban areas and in particular Havana.
    Population density in the capital reached 3,000 inhabitants/square kilometre

    Cuba was faced with a dual challenge of doubling food production with half the previous inputs, with some 74% of its population living in cities. Yet by 1997, Cubans were eating almost as well as they did before 1989, with little food and agrochemicals imported.

    By 1998, an estimated 541,000 tons of food were produced in Havana for local consumption. Food quality has also improved as people had access to a greater variety of fresh fruits and vegetables.
    Urban gardens continued to grow and some neighbourhoods were producing as much as 30% of their own food.

    The introduction of a diversified market-based system for food distribution has spurred increased agricultural productivity. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation estimated that between 1994 and 1998, Cuba tripled the production of tubers and plantains, and doubled the production of vegetables, which doubled again in 1999.
    Potatoes increased from 188,000 tons in 1994 to 330,000 ton in 1998, while beans increased by 60% and citrus by 110% from 1994 to 1999.

    Today, Vivero Alamar (Alamar Gardens) is an oasis amid the monotonous array of perfectly rectangular apartment blocks of Soviet-style housing in the Alamar district of eastern Havana. It is a 27-acre organic farm set in the middle of a city of two million people.Founded in 1994 on a small 9-acre parcel of land, it has become a 140-person business producing a steady harvest of a wide range of fruits and vegetables: lettuces, carrots, tomatoes, avocadoes, culinary and medicinal herbs, chard and cucumbers.After harvest the crops are sold directly to neighbours at a colourful farm stand. Vivero Alamar also sells a range of organic composts and mulches and a selection of patio plants.
    In 2005, this neighbourhood-managed worker-owned cooperative earned approximately US$180,000. After capital improvements and operating expenses, it pays each worker about US$500 a year; compared to the Cuban minimum wage of US$10 a month.

    Vivero Alamar is just one example, from Santiago de Cuba in the east to Pinar del Rio in the west, thousands of urban gardens are blossoming. Some 300,000 Cubans are busy growing their own fruits and vegetables and selling the surplus to their neighbours.

    Although urban agriculture is totally organic, the country as a whole is not but the amount of chemical inputs has been drastically reduced.
    Before 1989, Cuba used more than 1,000,000 tons of synthetic fertilisers a year. Today, it uses about 90,000 tons.
    During the same period, Cuba applied up to 35,000 tons of herbicides and pesticides a year. Today, it is about 1,000 tons.

    Cuba remains reliant on export agriculture to earn hard currency. It is a robust exporter of tobacco, sugar, coffee, and citrus fruits, and is selling a significant amount of the last three as certified organic. Foreign investment in such ventures is on the rise.

    Cuba's most impressive innovation is its network of urban farms and gardens. According to Cuba's Ministry of Agriculture, some 150,000 acres of land is being cultivated in urban and suburban settings, in thousands of community farms, ranging from modest courtyards to production sites that fill entire city blocks.

    Organoponicos, as they are called, show how a combination of grassroots effort and official support can result in sweeping change, and how neighbours can come together and feed themselves. When the food crisis hit, the organoponicos were an ad hoc response by local communities to increase the amount of available food. But as the power of the community farming movement became obvious, the Cuban government stepped in to provide key infrastructure support and to assist with information dissemination and skills sharing.

    Most organoponicos are built on land unsuitable for cultivation. They rely on raised planter beds. Once the organoponicos are laid out, the work remains labour-intensive. All planting and weeding is done by hand, as is harvesting. Soil fertility is maintained by worm composting. Farms feed their excess biomass, along with manure from nearby rural farms to worms that produce a nutrient-rich fertiliser. Crews spread about two pound of compost per square yard on the bed tops before each new planting.

    Gardeners come from all walks of life: artists, doctors, teachers. Fernando Morel, president of the Cuban Association of Agronomists said: "It's amazing. When we had more resources in the '80s, oil and everything, the system was less efficient than it is today."

    The City of Havana now produces enough food for each resident to receive a daily serving of 280 grams of fruits and vegetables a day. The UN food program recommends 305 grams.

    Joe Kovach, an entomologist from Ohio State University who visited Cuba on a 2006 research delegation sums up the situation: "In 25 years of working with farmers, these are the happiest, most optimistic, and best-paid farmers I have ever met." Long queues of shoppers form at the farm stalls, people are shopping for quality and freshness, the produce is harvested as they buy, reducing waste to a minimum.

    Urban agriculture nationwide reduces the dependence of urban populations on rural produce. Apart from organoponicos, there are over 104,000 small plots, patios and popular gardens, very small parcels of land covering an area of over 3,600 acres, producing more than the organoponicos and intensive gardens combined.

    There are also self-provisioning farms around factories, offices and business, more than 300 in Havana alone. Large quantities of vegetables, root crops, grains, and fruits are produced, as well as milk, meat, fish eggs and herbs. In addition, suburban farms are intensively cultivated with emphasis on efficient water use and maximum reduction of agrotoxins; these are very important in Havana, Santa Clara, Sancti Spiritus, Camaguey, and Santiago de Cuba.

    Shaded cultivation and apartment-style production allow year-round cultivation when the sun is at its most intense. Cultivation is also done with diverse soil substrate and nutrient solutions, mini-planting beds, small containers, balconies, roofs, etc with minimal use of soil.

    Production levels of vegetables have doubled or tipled every year since 1994, and urban gardens now produce about 60% of all vegetables consumed in Cuba, but only 50% of all vegetables consumed in Havana.

    We live in a world of increasing population and decreasing resources. The gap between the haves and the have-nots is greater than it has been in many years. We the people will need to eat, no matter what the future brings. The benefits of a system of urban agriculture like this are manyfold.

    I'm sorry if I didn't give a direct answer to your question Wildor. The original article which you quoted was written some time ago and the "5 years ago" was at the height of the food crisis. With only anecdotal evidence and my own experience to go by, I would say that the variety of foods available would have increased greatly, along with the freshness and quality of the produce. The organic system in use relies on mixed plantings and crop rotation as a part of the overall farming strategy and farm-gate sales means that food is much fresher when it arrives at the market-place than if it was imported from further away. Freshness increases the nutrient value (and flavour) of the produce as vitamins are lost over time from harvest to the plate.

    Here's a quote from another article published here.

    With meat scarce and fresh local vegetables in abundance since 1995, Cubans now eat a healthy, low-fat, nearly vegetarian, diet. They also have a healthier outdoor lifestyle and walking and bicycling have become much more common. "Before, Cubans didn't eat that many vegetables. Rice and beans and pork meat was the basic diet." Sanchez from the Foundation for Nature and Humanity said. "At some point necessity taught them, and now they demand vegetables."
    Last edited by Rodri; 02-12-2011 at 02:18 AM.
    PEACE

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