Cuba's warming relations with the US may undermine its agroecological city farms
Cuba's warming relations with the US may undermine its agroecological city farms
Julia Wright & Emily Morris
27th June 2015
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Lettuce on an Organic Farm in Havana, Cuba.
Photo: David Schroeder via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND).
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Cuba is a global exemplar of organic, agroecological farming, taking place on broad swathes of land in and around its cities, write Julia Wright & Emily Morris. These farms cover 14% of the country's agricultural land, employ 350,000 people, and produce half the country's fruit and vegetables. But can they survive exposure to US agribusiness?
For more than 20 years, Cuba has been developing a sophisticated urban and suburban food system, producing healthy food, improving the environment and providing employment. But how will the sector survive if the economy opens up to US agricultural and industrial trade and investment?
The first urban farms emerged spontaneously in Cuba out of the hardships of the early 1990s. People in towns and cities began to cultivate urban waste land and keep small livestock as a coping strategy.
Possibly the first co-ordinated effort was the Santa Fe project in the north-west of Havana City, initiated in 1991. Taking advantage of the available resources within the community, empty urban space was reclaimed for food production to help overcome irregular and inadequate food supplies.
More:
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2919056/cubas_warming_relations_with_the_us_may_undermine_its_agroecological_city_farms.html
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