Ministry of Agriculture’s municipal delegations

Cuban
Radar                                                                            Read Spanish Version 

Ministry
of Agriculture’s municipal delegations

A
service by the Radio Progreso Alternativa Havana Bureau

According
to an earlier announcement, on May 2 delegations of the Ministry of
Agriculture were created at the country’s 169 municipalities.

Experts
say that the delegations operate with a high degree of autonomy in
relation to agribusiness policies in each region. Apparently this is
based on an essential organizational concept: to facilitate
operations with the highest degree of efficiency, as well as the
marketing of produce. This latter aspect is important, for in order
to avoid the rotting of crops in the fields (not unheard of), because
it would allow the presence of other buyers besides the government’s
wholesale enterprise.

According
to knowledgeable sources, criteria for selecting those who will head
each delegation are based primarily on technical expertise, and not
necessarily on other qualities.

Relative
to the issue, Juan Varela Pérez wrote in Granma
that
"restructuring of the Agricultural System advocates the
elimination of 104 enterprises and the reengineering of most of the
remaining ones, converting them into service providers.”

The
awarding of idle or underdeveloped land to producers will be done by
municipal delegations, taking into account the proven efficiency of
farmers, whether they are individual producers or any of the
different forms of cooperative farms that exist in the country.

 

Commissions
of the Cuban parliament

On
May 5 the working commissions of the National Assembly of Popular
Power (ANPP) for the present legislature were formed.

According
to ANPP Speaker Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada, the commissions
will have a provisional character pending their approval at the first
session of the 7th legislature. During the previous legislature there
were ten commissions, but two new ones, one dedicated to the
agribusiness sector and another to the energy sector, will raise the
number to twelve.  The new commissions are considered key for
the development and security of the country.

ANPP
sources confirmed that the commission for the steel and mechanical
industry is already in session with workers and officials of this
sector. The Ministry of Steel and Mechanical Industry is scheduled to
present a report to the next legislature in the coming month of July.

Secretariat
of the Central Committee strengthened

The
6th Plenary of the Cuban Communist Party’s Central Committee, held on
April 28, voted to promote Roberto Morales Ojeda as member of the
Secretariat to oversee the public health sector.

Morales,
a medical doctor, held the post of first secretary of the Communist
Party in the province of Cienfuegos, in the Central South region of
the country. 

The
Secretariat is the assisting organ of the Politburo and its members
oversee the different sectors of the country.  

Cuba’s
International Tourism Fair

Tomorrow,
May 9, FITCUBA 2008, the International Tourism Fair, will celebrate
its closing session. This year the fair has made a special emphasis
on the relation between culture and the leisure industry.

As
in previous years, the fair’s venue has been the Morro Cabaña
Park, where airlines, tour operators and travel agencies have set up
their exhibits.

This
time, the country being honored as special guest is Italy.

The
longest Havana cigar

As
this note is drafted, Cuban cigar roller José Castelar Cairo
is about to finish the longest Havana cigar in the world. Cueto, as
he is called by his colleagues, hopes to break his own previous
Guinness record: a cigar 20.4 meters long.

Cueto’s
endeavor is part of the International Tourism Fair and his skill as a
cigar roller has caught the attention of attendees and, of course, of
the judges that will certify his new record.

Since
the piece will remain as a permanent exhibit, it will never be known
who could, and how long it would take, to smoke a Havana cigar of
that size.

Operation
Miracle in prisons

Granma
reported in its Monday, May 5, edition that the program of
ophthalmological assistance known as Operation Miracle is also taking
place in the prisons of the western province of Pinar del Río.

According
to the newspaper, Osmany Correa, regional coordinator of the program,
said that after only one month 100 inmates have already been operated
on to resolve the different conditions that could cause blindness.