CU Feeding Fidel
15 Aug 2002

(2 articles)

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL - G. Allen Andreas brought more than wine when he had dinner with Fidel Castro. Along with some California Cabernet, the chief of agricultural giant Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. toted cooking oil and three boxes of ADM's soy-enhanced pasta. While serving his guests roast pig and lobster tails, the Cuban president ordered his chef to whip up a bowl of the noodles with red sauce.  "The guy loved it," says Tony DeLio, ADM's chief of marketing, who attended the four-hour dinner in late April. "He ate three servings."  Feeding Fidel Castro has become the hot new product placement among U.S. politicos and corporate bosses. They are streaming to Havana to cut export deals made possible two years ago with a law that allowed U.S. sales of food and medicine on a cash-only basis. Business began to take off late last year as the Cuban government saw a lever for eventually lifting the 40-year U.S. ban on doing any trade with the country. Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Washington Democrat, dropped in on Mr. Castro in January with a bag of her state's apples. That prompted an order from Cuba's food-import agency for 1,000 tons of apples - "as juicy as the ones we had the opportunity to try" - plus 3,000 tons of Washington peas. The U.S. Dry Pea and Lentil Council cheered the deal on its Web site: "Bring on the Cuban cigars! Let's sell some peas!" After once vowing that he wouldn't buy "a single grain of rice" from the U.S., Mr. Castro has spent $110 million in cash so far this year for chicken legs, eggs, wheat, all kinds of dry legumes and lots of rice. Among the 180 countries that import food from the U.S., Cuba was dead last in 2000. This year it has rocketed to No. 54 as Mr. Castro sows support across the Farm Belt for ending the embargo. The Bush administration says it will do nothing to help or hinder the food sales, but top officials aren't keen to see the embargo loosened any further. The Cuban government, meanwhile, is milking the new relationship. Besides looking to erode the embargo, Havana officials get much-needed foodstuffs cheaper from nearby America, even if it means delaying payments for food bought on credit from many other international suppliers. Mr. Castro, 76 years old, declined to be interviewed, but his man in Havana in charge of the purchases said the presidential drop-bys are appreciated. "It's good that companies are bringing samples," says Pedro Alvarez, who runs Alimport, the government agency that buys food from abroad. "But of course the president doesn't eat everything he's given." ADM's Mr. DeLio says the president, who has been the target of poisoning attempts, laughed at his own rashness while eating the soy noodles and said, "If I'm going to go, I'm going to go." Dozens of states and hundreds of companies are now gearing up for a big, four-day U.S. food exposition next month in Havana. Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura says he'll attend. The Cubans have promised multimillion-dollar deals. At least 10 states are feuding over which of them will get to host top Cuban officials at one of three big dinners scheduled. North Dakota plans to fly down three buffaloes to compete with the dairy cows, hogs and chickens that other states are sending. Among the companies vying for deals, show sponsor ADM has designed a 1950s-style diner to serve soy burgers and shakes. David Radlo, president of Massachusetts-based Radlo Foods LLC, says he will send a man in a large egg outfit to the expo to help serve up breakfasts. Mr. Radlo recently shipped half a million eggs to Havana, including some "cage-free" organic brown eggs, which were forwarded to Mr. Castro. At a one-on-one meeting with the Cuban leader a week later, Mr. Radlo says Mr. Castro described how his chefs turned the eggs into flan and how he ate some for breakfast, first over easy and then sunny side up. "He said that with the sunny side ups, the yolks held their form in an amazing way," Mr. Radlo says. Not everyone wooing Mr. Castro has cashed in. California Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer brought some California lima beans and several bottles of Sonoma Chardonnay to her dinner in April with the Cuban leader. "The beans went over in a big way," her spokesman says. Even so, the Cubans have yet to order a single bean or anything else from California, although state officials say they may be close to a garlic deal. Cuba's total food imports - about $1 billion a year and growing - are relatively modest. But Eric Aasmundstad, head of the North Dakota Farm Bureau, says that if Cuba bought all its spring wheat from North Dakota, it would be the state's fourth- or fifth-biggest export market for wheat. Mr. Aasmundstad was in Havana with North Dakota Gov. John Hoeven, only the second U.S. governor to visit Cuba since the early 1960s. At Mr. Alvarez's office at Alimport, Gov. Hoeven and his group huddled in a room decorated with plastic ferns and prints of happy peasants. After hours of sometimes prickly negotiations, the two sides signed an agreement to sell the Cubans more than $2 million of chickpeas, barley, lentils and peas - enough to fill 128 rail cars. North Dakota also sent 20 tons of wheat, barley and peas by ship, a $4 million sale. While Gov. Hoeven was there, Cuban officials opened the wheat shipment at dawn one morning, whisked some off to a mill, and turned it into bread for a nine o'clock meeting at the Cuban Ministry of Food. Food Minister Alejandro Roca praised the loaves for having plenty of "good gluten."

Granma International - Havana - If three out of five people in the world eat rice as their basic sustenance, in Cuba it is almost unpardonable not to serve up the grain in a traditional meal. The rice quota distributed by the state at subsidized prices is not sufficient for the majority of the island's households. Thus many resort to buying their extra monthly needs at the various types of farmers' markets. Before the special period, Cuba required some 500,000 tons of rice each year to meet the population quota and provide for the needs of educational, social and public health institutions. A little over half was imported, whilst the rest was grown on the island. When the crisis resulting from the abrupt ending of supplies from the former Socialist bloc in the early 1990's began, Cuban rice - cultivated in extensive plantations consuming a large volume of electricity by using mechanized irrigation methods, herbicides and chemical fertilizers - dropped sharply. Imports of the grain increased, and efforts to continue raising production via output and economic efficiency were interrupted. But over and above the shortage of supplies, there was and is another more damaging factor in rice production - an unstable climate with long periods of drought followed by brief and violent outbreaks of rain. We asked Dr. Rubén Alfonso Carabello, director of the Institute for Rice Research (IAA), a basic question: "What is his institution doing to increase production and reduce prices in the farmers' markets?" He informed us that part of the answer lies in genetics. Obtaining new varieties of more productive rice that doesn't need so much irrigation or chemical fertilizers is one of the IIA's priorities, given the country's situation. Two new varieties of rice, IA-Cuba 29 and IA-Cuba 30, with 50% savings in chemical fertilizers, needing 30-35% less irrigation, and producing five to seven tons per hectare, are being cultivated in three areas of the island. The availability of those two new varieties of rice for production - there is a very promising third variety that has not yet been fully tested - is accompanied by comprehensive research offering producers all the necessary data to achieve maximum production potential. The main rice pest in Cuba is the Tagaso des origicolus, commonly known as sogata. Thus, as well as savings in water and resources, genetic improvers must consider resistance to this predator, which withers plants in their first 15-25 days of growth. According to the IIA director, the pest damaged 85% of the island's rice production in the 1970-72 harvests.  The new varieties are very important in relation to the program to increase cultivation on small plots of land by campesinos, cooperative farmers and agricultural workers who have not previously specialized in growing rice, explained Dr. Alfonso Carabello, given that plantations are generally located in areas with insufficient water. Some 80,000 farmers utilizing 130,000 hectares are participating in the popular movement. Those rice-growers produce crops for their families' consumption, and sell the excess in the farmers' markets, which are ruled by the laws of supply and demand.  It is estimated that this year, some 200,000 tons of rice will be produced, positively influencing the availability of the grain and leading to a fall in prices. How can damaged grains be avoided? Four research projects are aimed at pinpointing the optimum time for harvesting, drying possibilities, storage and industrial processing, in order to increase the percentage of complete grains. "There is a close relation between the percentage of crystalline grains and complete grains, which is why we are also seeking these qualities in the genetically modified varieties," the IIA director highlighted. "Given that Cuba's climate considerably reduces the production cycle and output is less, we are now introducing a Vietnamese variety well suited to the island's conditions, one that has been adapted to tropical conditions," he explained. Another reason is that Cuban people prefer the island's long grain, easy-to-cook rice to the short Asian and Japanese varieties. Nevertheless, the capital's inhabitants have not been able to enjoy the benefit of Cuban rice, because Havana's main sources come from China and Viet Nam. Three technologies predominate in Cuban rice production, originating from Spain, Japan and what remains of U.S. methods. The agricultural technology is mainly Cuban, incorporating some Venezuelan and Brazilian techniques. Venezuelan tractors fitted with rotary blades are being used to reduce the time needed for plowing the land in preparation for sowing; some Brazilian machines that sow directly without having to previously prepare the soil are being tried out in areas with suitable conditions. Minimum tilling is undertaken where the land conditions make it advisable, because Cuban agriculture aims to combine increased sustainability with a minimum impact on the environment, Dr. Alfonso Caballero explained. "We have substantially reduced chemical insecticides. Fourteen years ago these were applied at least six times during the cultivation span; nowadays we use them two, maybe three times. This is because we now use Cuban-produced bio-insecticides that offer protection from parasites and bugs. Some 200 tons of pesticides a year were used to control the sogata. "By using an integrated pesticide that incorporates genetic resistance and other agro-technical methods eliminating suitable conditions for pests, we have reduced pesticide rates by 70% per each ton of rice produced. Fuel-reducing techniques have led to a 40-45% drop in consumption," the researcher commented. Cuba needs to work toward internationally competitive prices. Current rice production stands at three tons per hectare. Plans for the next harvest are to increase that figure to an average of four tons (the world average fluctuates between 3.5-5 tons, but some countries produce 6-7 tons). Without abandoning the large state-owned rice plantations where some 30,000 hectares of the grain are cultivated, production has been reorganized to encourage improved cost effectiveness. The restructuring starts at field level and extends to plots of land, which are then integrated into farms. Costs are measured at farm levels. Thus human resources are better used, and irrigation improved. Using that method, better leveling can be achieved with lasers, a widespread technique in Venezuela and Brazil. Similarly, at field level stepped terraces can be constructed to improve irrigation, confirmed Alfonso Caballero. Because there is a large quantity of land unsuitable for planting rice every year, diversification means turning fallow land over to cattle breeding, poultry rearing and other crops. This method means that land is not subjected to the damage caused by repeated monoculture. One of the last biological attacks occurred four years ago when mites were introduced onto the island, threatening the rice crop on a large scale. Scientists fighting the plague used an integrated strategy, a combination of agricultural methods to halt the spread of the epidemic. The campaign was aimed at eliminating susceptible crops and utilizing the lowest possible volume of agro-chemicals.