CU information technology
Sept 13, 2002

CUBA'S INFORMATION SOCIETY BLOSSOMS 
BUT CASTRO KEEPS TIGHT CONTROL OVER WHO CAN OWN COMPUTERS 
NBC NEWS - By Mary Murray 

HAVANA, Sept. 13 - Forget everything you know about junior high school and balking adolescents yearning for school to end. In Cuba, schools no longer empty out with afternoon dismissal. In fact, some kids stick around until dark, reluctantly sent home at 10 p.m. when the custodian locks the doors. What's the attraction? The computer lab. 

AT HAVANA'S Anton Makarenko Secondary School, a computer science teacher carefully guards eight Pentium II-equipped machines in a narrow classroom strategically placed catty-corner to the principal's office. The location is supposed to guarantee some sort of order. 

But even the presence of the ultimate authority figure does little to quiet the mob of 7th graders clamoring for second period. "At times, their enthusiasm overwhelms me," admits Julia Esther Rodriguez, who's been showing kids the world of computers since 1985. Her fatigue is understandable. The kids racing to get their hands on a keyboard look more like try-outs for some kind of competitive sport. 

In recent years, Fidel Castro repeatedly pledged to create an "information society" and a young generation capable of handling world-class technology. 

To that end, he equipped every school on the island with computers - even the little rural schoolhouses with less than a dozen students. 

Starting in first grade, Cuban students get their first exposure to computers. By 3rd grade, they begin learning to navigate Microsoft Windows, Office and local software programs. 

This summer, the government sent PCs to target day care centers to see how teachers use didactic games to teach toddlers their colors and numbers. 

Eight Cuban universities and dozens of adult education programs currently offer degrees in computer science. 

The government also sponsors 300 local computer clubs, comprising the core of the island's public access program. Over the past 15 years, these "Joven Clubs" provided computer training to some 465,000 young Cubans - many of whom went on to become computer teachers or programmers. 

Despite the serious push to make every Cuban computer literate, private workstations are rare on the island - and getting rarer by the minute. 

AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED 
Earlier this year, government stores quietly removed all computers and computer accessories available to the public. Any individual now in the market to buy a computer, foreigners and Cubans alike, must request authorization from the Ministry of Internal Commerce. A special office then reviews the applicant's paperwork to decide if the computer is "indispensable." 

Even when Cubans could buy computers, few could afford the pricey merchandise that often sold with a minimum 140 percent mark-up. Nowadays, prices are even steeper since consumers have little choice but to rummage around on the black market. 

FOREIGNERS ONLY 
A professor married to a heart surgeon in a rural town some 150 miles east of Havana recently paid about triple for a desktop computer. She bought the PC from a Cubana Airline pilot who buys luxury items abroad for re-sale at home. The professor, whose savings failed to stretch far enough, uses the computer primarily to finish her doctoral studies. 

"I ended up asking my mother and sister in Miami to help me pay for the computer," she said. The professor did not want her name used. While many speculate, no one really knows why the government yanked computers off store shelves or, most recently, dictated who can and - more importantly - who cannot use the cyber-cafés located in the island's hotels. 

In a July 18 memo, Carlos Gómez, tourist vice minister, reminded all hotel managers, "Hotel Internet service is only available to hotel guests and foreigners not residing in the hotel." Not good business since Cubans constituted the bulk of the clientele. 

Local Internet users connect mainly at school or work. Access differs depending on who you are. Most college students and hospital physicians only surf selected Web pages posted on national Intranets, while research scientists can access full Internet service. 

SINISTER MOTIVES? 
Cuban dissident Marta Roque believes that old-fashion government censorship motivates the government's digital policy. 

"They knew dissidents were buying computers and constructing Web sites," said Roque who served a three-year prison term after urging foreigners to cut trade ties with Cuba. 

Cuban authorities bristle at that charge, claiming it's simply a matter of money. "Cuba is a poor and economically blockaded country that rations food and experiences medicine shortages," said Sergio Perez, director of Teledatos, a principal Internet provider. "How could people's access to the Internet not be limited?" 

Internet managers freely admit that present connections fall short of offering the appropriate bandwidth to meet current demand. 

A U.S. study discovered that Cuba's total bandwidth just three years ago ranked "less than a home with a high-speed DSL service or cable modem." 

ANTI-CONSUMER MENTALITY 
But, that still doesn't explain the computer sale ban. 

A neighbor who keeps the books for a local retail chain blames it on Cuba's "anti-consumer mentality." Understandable. Anyone who has ever shopped in socialist Cuba knows it's far from consumer-friendly. 

But teacher Julia Rodriguez believes egalitarian principles led to the ban. The computers were needed to stock the schools. "They had to come from somewhere," said Rodriguez. Any day now she's expecting a donation of recycled PCs from a state-owned company upgrading their system, as mandated by government decree. 

She also asks, "What child doesn't want their own computer? But, who deserves one? The child whose parents can afford one? 
.Here, we don't think that's fair." 

Out of Rodriguez's 318 students, less than two dozen have the use of home computers. That small inequity, believes Rodriguez, 
prompted the Education Ministry to start the after-school program, "giving all kids equal access." 

BETTER OFF THAN MOST 
No computers for sale? No easy Internet connection? These are alien concepts to outsiders. 

But, Dr. Nelson Valdés considers critics wrong to judge Cuba with "biased" criteria from industrialized countries. The University of New Mexico professor just prepared a paper entitled "Cuba, Internet and Information Technology 2001" for the Ford Foundation where he wrote: "PCs are not a common household resource in the developing world." 

While one computer exists for every three people in the U.S., for instance, you find one for every 143 Brazilians. By those standards at least, Valdés found Cubans better off. "In 1991, at the time of the demise of the USSR, Cuba had just 15,000 PCs for the entire country. As of September 2000, there were 1.8 computers per 100 inhabitants in Cuba." 

THE DIGITAL DIVIDE 
The study did find Cuba struggling to overcome the same digital disadvantage plaguing other developing countries - what Valdés and other label "the digital divide" - the global gap between the digital haves and have-nots. High prices make owning a computer prohibitive for many Cubans. 

On average, the Cuban government spends about $1,300 on every imported computer - "a price tag very few households could afford. .That's why over 90 percent of all new PCs are purchased by the state for social use," the study said. 

What's more, just a little over five percent of the world's population uses the Internet - 88 percent from developed countries. 

"The United States and Canada account for 57 percent of the world's Internet users . (and) only two percent of all Latin American households have connectivity. 

"If Internet and e-mail access are measured primarily by counting households with a computer, a modem, a telephone and an Internet account, significant sectors of the world population will be overlooked because they are not able to afford such things. In fact, using these indicators, only 2.4 percent of the world's population had Internet access," the study said. But try explaining the digital divide to a group of Cuban teenagers longing to surf the World Wide Web from the luxury of their home. 

FALSE EXPECTATIONS? 
Some Cuban parents worry that all the training may lead to frustration. 

"False expectations," fears the stepfather of a high school sophomore who just finished a course on designing web pages, even though she is barely familiar with the Web. 

"This generation is coming to expect more than our economy can give. Maybe too much education is a bad thing." 

Blasphemous thoughts in a country that prides itself on having built one of the region's best education systems. 

Even the World Bank, while reproaching Castro's iron clad control over the economy, has praised his achievements in education. 

In a region where two million children have no primary schools, Cuba boasts a 100 percent grade school enrollment. While 20 million Latin American teenagers are dropouts, no illiteracy exists among young Cubans 15 to 24. 

Cuba wrestles with different problems - namely, a glut of over-educated and under-employed workers. 

One atomic engineer, who lost her job when Cuba stopped work on a nuclear power plant, sells camera supplies. The trainer at a local gym has a degree in social work and his wife, in wholesale clothing, studied architecture. 

So, why train more professionals if you can't find work for the ones you have? 

HARNESSING CUBA'S BRAINPOWER 
Valdés thinks Castro may be hatching a plan to harness computer brainpower in much the same way he forged a biotech industry that now holds intellectual property rights to 150 products and 500 registered patents outside of Cuba. The biotech industry reported sales of $50 million last year. 

From one year to the next, conceives Valdés, the island could easily train 20,000 professional programmers capable of tailoring 
software and applications for clients abroad. "Neither the US Department of Education nor Bill Gates can do that." 

While Castro hasn't revealed anything, something is emerging. 

Drive past Lourdes - a sprawling concrete outpost Havana's southern outskirts built by the Soviets to eavesdrop on U.S. secrets. 

Moscow closed the facility down last year, dismantled the spy center and sent its spies home. 

Instead of crying over spilt milk - namely the loss of $200 million a year in rent - the regime began to quietly transform the spy base into a high-tech university. When its doors open this month, 2,000 students will begin four years of college to learn the latest in computer and software development aimed at the world market. 

Mary Murray is NBC's Havana bureau chief.