CUBA BUSINESS SECTION - Havana Journal > Business In Cuba
By Esteban Israel | Reuters
A popular website of classified ads that has given Cubans a taste of the free market has been blocked on the communist-run island, Internet users said.
Cubans trying to access Revolico.com, which says it has more than 1.5 million page views a month, are being diverted to the search engine Google.com.
“If I type the address and press ‘enter,’ I get redirected. If I Google it and click, I get redirected. What is going on?,” asked Sandra a 30-year-old government employee who, like several others interviewed, did not give their full names.
Cuban…
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By Marc Frank in Havana | Financial Times
The Cuban government is considering easing its stranglehold on the retail sector in an effort to legalize the underground economy and reduce massive theft. It is President Raul Castro’s second big economic reform after last year’s decentralization of agriculture and the leasing of idle state land.
A recent communiqué from the Communist party’s central committee suggested change was coming to one of the world’s two remaining Soviet-style command economies, the other being North Korea.
“Raul stated the key premises for economic policy to the end of the year and next were decentralization…
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AP
Upscale grocery stores that were scheduled to close two days last week for inventory remained shuttered Monday — sparking rumors of food shortages because of the country’s dire economic situation.
More than a dozen stores in Cuba’s capital that had been run by the now-defunct firm Cubalse closed Thursday to tally merchandise before they were transferred to the new managing company, TRD Caribe. The change is part of a government effort to streamline bureaucracy.
When they didn’t reopen Saturday as scheduled, customers started to get concerned. Cuba has seen its revenue from nickel and other exports plummet, leaving it…
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By WILL WEISSERT | Associated Press
Raul Castro announced Saturday that Cuba will cut spending on education and health care, potentially weakening the building blocks of its communist system in a bid to revive a foundering economy.
The former defense minister who took over the presidency last year called state spending “simply unsustainable” and said the cash-strapped government would reorganize rural schools and scrutinize its free health care system in search of ways to save money.
But he vowed that the island will not see fundamental change even after he and his older brother and predecessor, Fidel Castro, are…
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THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Cuba on Friday suspended plans for a Communist Party congress and lowered its 2009 economic growth projection to 1.7 percent — nearly a full percentage point — as the island’s economy struggles through a “very serious” crisis.
In a closed-door meeting of the Communist Party Central Committee, officials agreed to postpone indefinitely the first congress since 1997, which had been announced for the second half of this year.
The gathering was to chart Cuba’s political future long after President Raul Castro and his brother Fidel are gone. Instead, top communists will try and pull their country back…
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By Marc Frank | Reuters
Cash-strapped Cuba should consider putting more of its state-run economy in the hands of producers, as President Raul Castro has done with agriculture, the country’s top economic commentator said on Tuesday.
Ariel Terrero, during his regular Tuesday appearance on state-run television, did not call for private management, but suggested that sectors such as food services and retail could perform better if they were run in a new way.
“In the Cuban economy, there’s a need to look for formulas more dynamic, more intelligent, of understanding property, of running a business, of running a cafeteria,” he…
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Juan O. Tamayo | ICCAS
Cuba’s cellular telephone service mushroomed in 2008, but the remainder of its telecommunications and information technology sectors were stagnant or even shrank, according to the most recent report from the Havana government.
The data released by the Office of National Statistics (ONE) (1) in fact put Cuba at or near the hemisphere’s bottom in terms of fixed telephone lines, personal computers and access to the Internet. ONE’s data, especially on the economy, is sometimes regarded as suspect. But its June report is so grim that it’s difficult to…
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By Marc Frank | Reuters
Cuba is cutting estimates of imports by billions of dollars this year and projecting a decline in export revenues due to the international financial crisis, according to a government report shown to Reuters this week.
The Economy and Planning Ministry forecast was drawn up within two months of President Raul Castro’s replacement in March of Cuba’s entire economic leadership team after a dismal 2008 performance.
The report outlines adjustments to the 2009 plans of the old cabinet, including projections of 2.5 percent economic growth compared with the original 6 percent.
The report says imports will…
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Marc Frank | Reuters
Cuban factories are closing down and production is being cut at other workplaces as the international financial crisis weighs on the import-dependent Caribbean island, the official media said on Sunday.
A growing shortage of foreign exchange has forced the Communist-run country to drastically cut imports and local budgets, impose power quotas on state-run companies, restructure debt and put off payments to foreign suppliers.
The state-run Juventud Rebelde newspaper, the only national Sunday publication, said a tire factory had shut down since February due to a lack of rubber imports while an aluminum packaging plant cut output…
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By Marc Frank | Reuters (bold below by me for emphasis)
Cuba has rolled over 200 million euros in bond issues that were due in May, as the country’s central bank asked for another year to repay foreign holders of the debt, financial sources in London and Havana said this week.
The move is yet another sign the Communist-run nation is suffering a cash crisis, as it struggles with sharp declines in revenues from tourism and key exports due to the global economic crisis.
The two-year euro-denominated bonds of 150 million euros and 50 million euros that were rolled over…
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