In 2011 Cuba approved a new economic policy with the purpose of relaunching its economy while preserving the main social achievements of the socialist model. The bet is high enough to raise doubts and questions around the success of such a major economic transformation. The reality is that, in spite of fears and resistances against the “updating” of the Cuban economic model, domestic changes are mandatory in order to build up a prosper and sustainable socialism, idea that President Raúl Castro has promoted as the core and key goal of the socioeconomic changes. This presentation explores the current relations of Cuba and the CARICOM countries as well as the expected changes this relationship may undergo in the near future.

1. Cuba and CARICOM in the
changing environment
PhD. Jacqueline Laguardia Martinez
Seminar “Analysing Current Issues in the Changing
Hemispheric Environment”
Guyana, April 11th, 2014

2. Talking points
1. The Cuba-Caribbean relation: Cuba and
CARICOM
2. Cuba´s changing environment and its
impacts on its relations with the
Caribbean

3. Cuban Foreign Policy
• It responds to issues regarding survival, national identity and
ideological positions in total coherence with the Cuban social
project
• Open critic to USA aggressive foreign policy
• Global vision
• International activism
• Promoter of the representation of the developing world
• Supporter of preventive action aimed at meeting social and
economic needs lead by multilateral organizations (UNESCO, FAO,
UNDP, WHO, Human Rights Council)
• Solidarity as main philosophy and cooperation as
implementation mechanism in the search for an international
insertion qualitatively different. Since 1961 Cuba has registered
cooperation actions in 157 countries with the participation of
more than 400.000 Cubans

4. In the Caribbean
• Strength in the union with natural neighbors
• Decolonization and non-intervention
• Solidarity and integration before domination and
competition
• Cooperation as a mechanism to apply the solidarity
principle:
a. Social and Development goals: healthcare, education,
sports, infrastructure
b. Security reasons: drugs and international crime, natural
disasters and climate change impacts

5. Cuba – Caribbean relations: Isolation
• 1959: Cuba is labeled as the communist menace in the
hemisphere
• 1962: Cuba is expelled from the OAS: 14 in favor, with one
against (Cuba) and six abstentions (Argentina, Bolivia,
Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, and Mexico)
• Isolation and exclusion (Benefits: DR obtained the Cuban
sugar quota in the USA markets, American tourists found
new destinies in the Caribbean,…)
• 1961: Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), Presidency in 1979
and 1983
• 1964: G-77

6. • 1972: Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago
established diplomatic relations with Cuba
• 1983: Grenada Invasion
• 1990’s: Implosion of the USSR and the European Socialist Block
• Construction of new alliances
• Promote the participation in international and regional spaces
where the USA does not participate: CARICOM, ACS, SELA,
Ibero-American Summits, ALADI, Grupo de Rio, as a way to
counterbalance renewed aggressive policy by the USA (Torricelli
in 1992 and Helms-Burton in 1996 Acts)
• Do not accept conditionality regarding economic reforms
towards free trade or neoliberal policies
Cuba – Caribbean relations

7. • 1991: A CARICOM Commission visited Havana
• 1993: Establishment of the CARICOM-Cuba Joint Commission
• 1994: Cuba joins the Association of Caribbean States (ACS)
• 2000: Cuba joins the African, Caribbean and Pacific group (ACP)
• 2000: Trade and Economic Co-operation Agreement between Cuba
and CARICOM. (Two Protocols)
• 2002: First Summit Cuba-CARICOM
• 2005: Second Summit Cuba-CARICOM
• 2008: Third Summit Cuba-CARICOM
• 2009: OAS approves the possibility of Cuba’s return
• 2011: Fourth Summit Cuba-CARICOM
• Since 1992: general condemnation to the USA Blockade
From the 90´s: sustained growth

8. Cuban diplomatic relations with the CARICOM States
Countries Dates
Antigua and Barbuda 1994
Bahamas 1974
Barbados 1972
Belize 1995
Dominica 1996
Granada 1979
Guyana 1972
Haiti 1998
Jamaica 1972
Dominican Republic 1998
Saint Kitts and Nevis 1995
Saint Lucia 1992
Saint Vincent and Grenadines 1992
Suriname 1979
Trinidad and Tobago 1972

9. Cuban cooperation in the Caribbean
• No ideological-political preconditions
• OPERACIÓN MILAGRO: Cuba has opened eye-
surgery centers
• YO SÍ PUEDO: Literacy campaign
• High quality program of prevention against natural
disasters consequences, recognized by UNDP
• Energy saving program
• Scholarships

10. Países Total
Caribe 1377
Antigua 55
Aruba 4
Bahamas 42
Barbados 3
Belice 119
Curazao 0
Dominica 36
Granada 25
Guadalupe 2
Haití 466
Islas Caimán 0
Islas Vírgenes 0
Jamaica 140
Rep. Dominicana 59
Martinica 0
San Vicente 67
Santa Lucía 47
Suriname 22
Trinidad Tobago 96
Guyana 178
Puerto Rico 0
San Martín 0
Saba 0
Turcos y Caicos 0
Guyana Francesa 0
Bonaire 1
San Kitts y Nevis 14
Antillas Holandesas 1
Cuban personnel
working in the
Caribbean, 2010

11. Cuba-CARICOM relation: A Positive Balance
1. Institutionalization
2. Sustained cooperation: health,
education, sports, culture
3. Political support to Cuba´s initiatives in
the UN

12. 1. The relations are concentrated in the political and
cooperation sectors
2. The economic relations are not substantial:
 High cost of air and sea transportation
 Legal and institutional differences
 Insufficient finance and credit mechanisms
 USA blockade
But…

13. 1. The singularity of Cuba economic and political
model
2. The “collective/shared sovereignty” criteria
3. The comprehensive revision that Cuba’s
economy will endure (as Surinam in 1995 and
Haiti in 1997)
4. The high dependency that CARICOM economies
(and the CARICOM as a regional structure) have
with the USA
Cuba is not Member of CARICOM because:

14. Obama administration towards Cuba
• Ignored U.S. demands to remove ALL Cuba travel ban (roll
back the Clinton era Cuba travel )
• Ignored demands to remove the blockade
• Remained essentially the position of his predecessors of
the need for “regime change in Cuba”, created mechanisms
to organize and promote the internal counterrevolution
• Bases its rankings in denying legitimacy to the Revolution,
the government and its institutions, confrontation based
on human rights and fundamental freedoms
• Inclusion of Cuba in the so-called List of States promoting
international terrorism of the United States’ State
Department (Cuba was included since 1982)

15. Cuba´s new economic model
“Actualización del modelo
económico socialista"

16. Goal
To make “economic
issues” a key criteria in
Cuban policies and
actions
VI Congress of the Cuban Communist Party, 2011
Main subject of
discussion
“Updating of the Cuban
Economic Model”

17. Cuban social contract bases
1. Same opportunities to all
2. Universal access to social services (health,
education 100% by public provision)
3. State protection from poverty and
abandonment
4. Fundamental means of production remain
state owned

18. Guidelines for UPDATING
• Political understanding of the urgency of transformations
• Deep economic transformation due to domestic problems
and not external shocks
• It is not merely a generational takeover
• Synergies between economic growing and development (to
move forward of the “crisis management”)
• Need of having a comprehensive socioeconomic vision
• Need to redefine the agents of the economy
• New institutionalization
• Structural transformations of the Cuban statist centralized
model

19. Impacts in the cooperation programs
• The updating of the economic model, together with the
global economical crisis and the negative effects of hurricanes
(2008) have had an impact in the Cuban traditional
cooperation approach: urgency to search for new
cooperation possibilities
• But still will be present as a main component of Cuba
international insertion
• Cooperation understanding still broader than technical
assistance an very much focus on capacity building and
development goals (Human Resources)
• To include certain economic rationality in the cooperation
programs
• To implement new modalities: triangulated cooperation
initiatives

20. Triangular cooperation initiatives
• Cuban joint action in Haiti with Venezuela, Brazil and
Norway (Special attention to Haiti for being the most
poor country in the hemisphere, for having fought
the first independence Revolution in the Americas
and because of the Haitian descendants living in
Cuba)
• Ongoing Colombian peace negotiations together
with Norway and accompanied by Venezuela

21. Triangulated cooperation with Venezuela in Haiti
• Establishment of 10 Integral Diagnostic Centers
• Operation Milagros
• Three Electricity Generating Equipments installed in
Port au Prince, Gonaives and Cap Haitian
• 15 projects within the Food Program (irrigation, forest,
seeds, various crops, small livestock, poultry, pigs,
mechanization, plant protection, aquaculture,
agribusiness and food production for sugar agro
industrial development.
• Collaboration in the sugar sector in Central Darbonne

22. Cooperation: other actors to be included
• Brazil
• China
• ALBA
• CELAC
• Cuba bilateral relations
• Cuba as founder and main
supporter of the recent
regional fora

23. Conclusions

24. • Full use of the Cuba-CARICOM Agreements
• Full use of being part of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating
Machinery
• Major association with other regional organizations that
allow to Non Member States to participate as Observers.
Cuba has been invited to work with Caribbean Disaster
Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA), Caribbean
Centre for Development Administration (CARICAD) and
Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute
(CARDI)
• To evaluate the possibility of becoming Observer within this
organizations
• To evaluate the possibility of becoming Observer in certain
Ministerial Committees as the Council for Trade and
Economic Development (COTED)
Possibilities to intensify Cuba-CARICOM relations

25. To sustain cooperation programs making use of
the possibilities opened due to the new
regional and domestic contexts and
considering Cuban current changing process
• Brazil and Venezuela as regional actors with strong
presence in the Caribbean
• New regional fora and available funds
• Cuba’s new understanding of international
cooperation, but still a main pillar of Cuban regional
projection
• To move gradually some of the programs from Cuba to
the recipient countries