Cuba's investment in agriculture will spike in 2021

HAVANA, Cuba, Dec 17 (ACN) The Cuban government announced it will invest over one billion pesos in agriculture next year, a 43 percent increase compared to 2020, in order to boost production and to eradicate shortages in markets.

Ag Minister Gustavo Rodríguez Rollero reported to Cuban lawmakers that, during 2020 the country invested some 760 million pesos in 138 projects, but those figures will spike next year.

He explained that the rice program advances in the construction and technological assembly of the equipment acquired by the Chinese credit, which includes treatment and classification plants of rice seeds, drying and rice mills, weighing scales and bases of storage silos of 500 and one thousand tons.

For the production of grains, it is concluded the technological assembly of the four plants of drying, benefit, storage and packing of grains, in Las Tunas, Holguín, Granma and Santiago de Cuba, financed by the collaboration project PRODECOR, which will increase the processing capacity in 300 tons of beans and maize per day.

Likewise, work is being done in the civil works on the assembly of the 40 irrigation machines that will be received this year from the national industry, according to the schedule that began in the first ten days of October, which will benefit 1,397 hectares.

In the livestock programs, priority is given to actions for the recovery of 31 infrastructure works, including slaughterhouses, typical cattle farms, bull feeders and water reservoirs. Actions of environmental sanitation and the recovery of 32 pig farms and 18 poultry farms are being carried out.

Crops of interest for export such as coffee, cocoa and coconut are benefited with the construction of grain drying patios, the assembly of equipment in the CANE processing plant and the conclusion of a new factory to increase the extraction of coconut oil in Baracoa.

In addition, the construction of four charcoal plants was completed, including one in Bauta, 25 kilometers from the port of Mariel with the capacity to process 32 thousand tons of this product annually.