March 14, 2012
Business Recorder Logo Cuba's 2011-2012 coffee crop topped 7,000 tonnes
of semi-processed beans, the best performance in more than a decade, as
reforms aimed at reducing imports apparently kicked in, state-run radio
reported at the weekend.
"With the collection of 7,100 tonnes of coffee the country produced 10
percent more than planned, and an increase of 24 percent compared with
the previous harvest," Radio Rebelde said, reporting on the official
closing of the picking season on Saturday.
The Agriculture Ministry's director of coffee production, Elexis Legra
Pelegrin, speaking in eastern Cuba where the season was officially
closed, said 88 percent of the crop was processed and 85 percent of
beans were of high quality, a 15 percent increase over the previous harvest.
Legra Pelegrin called on farmers to meet planting plans and improve
efficiency during the 2012-2013 harvest to "meet the 8,500 tonnes planed."
Picking begins in August and ends in March, though most beans are
harvested from October into January.
Communist Cuba's 35,000 growers, in exchange for low-interest government
credits and subsidised supplies, must sell all of their coffee to the
state at prices that historically have been below what the beans fetch
on the black market.
Local analysts said 10 to 20 percent of the crop was diverted, though
recent increases in state prices may have lessened the flow.
The country's plantations, which at the time of the 1959 revolution
produced 60,000 tonnes of coffee, have steadily declined ever since.
Cuban president Raul Castro, as part of his efforts to improve food
production and cut massive imports, has pointed to coffee as a crop ripe
for increased attention and growth.
Cuba reported that it imported 18,000 tonnes of semi-processed beans
from Vietnam in 2010 at a cost of $38 million.
The state has leased abandoned coffee plantations over the last few
years to hundreds of individuals to grow coffee and has nearly tripled
the price it pays farmers for their beans.
Cuban farmers are now growing coffee in the lowlands with the aim of
both selling to the state and directly to consumers, according to local
media.
Plans call for producing 22,000 tonnes in 2015 and eventually 28,000 to
30,000 tonnes a year, equal to levels in the 1970s.
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