Venezuela, Cuba Said Invest in Projects

Venezuela, Cuba Said Invest in Projects
Thursday February 16, 1:23 pm ET
Reoprt Says Venezuela, Cuba Invest Some $26 Million in Joint
Agricultural Projects

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) -- Venezuela and Cuba invested some US$26
million (euro21.9 million) in joint agricultural projects last year, the
government news agency reported.

Cuban specialists have helped set up chicken, rabbit and pig farms that
have benefited 2,500 low-income Venezuelans, under a series of
cooperative projects, said Francisco Galan, a vice minister at Cuba's
Agriculture Ministry, in a Bolivarian News Agency broadcast late Wednesday.

Thirty-three Cuban specialists have also been training Venezuelans in
agricultural techniques in the cultivation of aromatic plants and other
farming projects, Galan said.

Relations between the two countries have tightened under President Hugo
Chavez, who has signed various cooperative agreements with Cuba
involving education, health, sports and oil since taking office in 1999.

Venezuela, the world's fifth-largest oil exporter, began selling to Cuba
in December 2000 about 53,000 barrels a day of crude under favorable
financing. It raised those exports to 90,000 barrels a day in 2004.

The government of Fidel Castro also has sent 17,000 Cuban doctors to
provide medical attention to Venezuelans in poor neighborhoods across
the country.

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/060216/venezuela_cuba.html?.v=1