By Marc Frank HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba opened its first wholesale market for farmers in decades on Sunday, an experiment limited to agricultural supplies in one area and the latest market-oriented reform for the communist-run island. While Cuba has allowed nearly 500,000 small business owners and their employees to operate privately and hundreds of thousands of farmers to grow their own crops, it has been slow to give them access to wholesale markets. Even though the farming sector has been the most liberalized, Cuba continues to import more than 60 percent of its food, in part because farmers still depend on state-run allocation and distribution of subsidized supplies. Since President Raul Castro took over from ailing brother Fidel in 2008, fallow state lands have been leased, and farmers are freer to sell directly to consumers.
Read More http://ift.tt/1oXQKYW
No comments:
Post a Comment