Cuba downgrades 2014 GDP forecast to 1.4 percent

Cuba downgrades 2014 GDP forecast to 1.4 percent
June 23, 2014

HAVANA (AP) — Cuba has revised its 2014 economic growth forecast
downward to 1.4 percent, Communist Party newspaper Granma said Monday,
nearly a point off previous projections of 2.2 percent.

Economy Minister Adel Yzquierdo attributed the downgrade to lagging
foreign income, adverse climatic conditions and "internal
insufficiencies that our economy continues to confront," Granma said.

The downgrade came in a midyear report by the Council of Ministers.

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President Raul Castro acknowledged that the adjusted figure shows Cuba's
economy is not growing at the desired pace, according to Granma.

Yzquierdo said officials predict growth for the first half of 2014 will
come in at just 0.6 percent, and "greater dynamism in the second
semester" is needed.

Cuba says GDP grew 2.7 percent last year.

In 2010, Castro said Cuba's economy was in a critical situation and
began implementing a package of economic reforms. They have included
decentralizing state-owned enterprises, legalizing real-estate and
used-car markets and allowing more people to legally go into business
for themselves.

The czar of the reforms, Vice President Marino Murillo, said in the
Ministers' gathering that 467,000 people have registered as
small-business owners or employees. Some 498 nonagricultural
cooperatives have been licensed.

Source: Cuba downgrades 2014 GDP forecast to 1.4 percent - Businessweek
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http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2014-06-23/cuba-downgrades-2014-gdp-forecast-to-1-dot-4-percent