At the front of the convention hall is the slogan: "We are present in the economic and political struggle!"

Two other banners contain quotes from Cuban president Fidel Castro, "This is not only a battle for food, this is also a great political battle, an ideological battle," and from Raúl Castro, "Beans are as important as guns, or more so."

ANAP was founded in 1961 through the incorporation of various farmers' and ranchers' organizations and more than 100,000 small producers who gained title to their land through the agrarian reform. That defining act of the Cuban revolution was led by the workers and farmers government that was consolidated in 1959 following an armed insurrection and mass popular uprising against the U.S.-backed dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista.

ANAP organizes individual small farmers and farmers who operate in two kinds of cooperatives--Credit and Service Cooperatives, which are voluntary associations of peasants who maintain their individual farms but pool efforts to organize supplies and sell their produce, and Agricultural Production Cooperatives, voluntary associations of farmers who combine their land and machinery and farm collectively. ANAP also organizes independent peasants in the Peasant Association. Small farmers in Cuba possess about 20 percent of the arable land, and produce around one third of the agricultural production.

The delegates represent 200,000 farmers in Cuba, of which 150,000 own their land individually or collectively, and the rest are family members who work with them. Some 28,000 of the members are women.

At the first plenary session the delegates discussed their efforts to improve production of several important crops, including sugar cane, tobacco, and coffee. For each crop, ANAP delegates discussed and adopted goals for the next year. Later they discussed raising overall production, reducing costs, and making more meat, milk, and vegetables available for sale at markets in the towns and cities at lower prices. Crop yields vary greatly from cooperative to cooperative. Delegates from coops that have increased production explained how they have done it, discussing the importance of a stable workforce, of careful and accurate accounting, and above all of leadership.

A woman from Guantánamo described how her coop increased milk production and undercut price-gougers in the local farmers market. Virtually all dairy cattle are milked by hand in Cuba. There is a milk shortage, some farmers explained, due to the drought that has affected the region in the last couple of years, and due to the shortage of feed.

Cuba imported grain for animals, powdered milk, and many other food products from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union prior to 1989 when the regimes there began to fall "like a meringue," as Cubans say. When aid and favorable trade relations with those countries ended abruptly, Cuba went through a period of extreme economic dislocation and shortages known as the "special period." Production contracted by an estimated 35 percent between 1989 and 1993.

Milk production, like that of other agricultural products, has been recovering in the past few years, but is still far below the quantities needed. Throughout even the worst period, however, pregnant women, children under seven years old, and the elderly have continued to receive a government-guaranteed liter of milk a day.

During a discussion on the sugar cane goal, ANAP president Orlando Lugo Fonte explained that the projected 25 tons per acre for sugar cane production would mean increased food supplies for all Cubans. "We can use some of the land now used for sugar cane for other crops," he pointed out. "We have to diversify the crops we grow in our cooperatives. As word of this gets out the workers will know we can achieve more food production and improve life."

Raúl Castro explained the importance of the peasants in Cuba's history of revolutionary struggle. "The Mambí army fought with machetes for Cuban independence," he said. "Who were they? Peasants. Who formed the backbone of the Rebel Army 40 years ago? Peasants. Today it is very costly to maintain the Cuban army, and peasants play an important role. The unity of the workers and peasants is the motor force of the revolution."

Delegates also expressed their determination to continue the mobilizations of the Cuban people demanding the U.S. government allow Elián González to return with his father to Cuba.

Some 70 international guests are attending the congress from Mexico, Brazil, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Chile, Spain, and the United States. A leader of Brazil's Movement of Landless Rural Workers (MST) read greetings on behalf of the international delegations.

The U.S. delegation, sponsored by the Atlanta Network on Cuba, includes seven farmers and two workers. The participants in the trip include two farmers from Georgia, a farmer from Illinois who grows organic vegetables, and four dairy farmers. Three of the dairy farmers are from Wisconsin and are members of the Family Farm Defenders and the international organization Via Campesina. Another dairy farmer is from Vermont and belongs to Rural Vermont.

All are activists in the movement of small farmers in the United States fighting to keep from losing their land through the economic squeeze caused by capitalism's low commodity prices, scarce credit, and rising costs of production. The farmers who are Black are also part of the movement to win monetary compensation and debt relief for the racist policies of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which have driven tens of thousands of farmers who are Black off their land in the last decades.

Willie Head, a vegetable farmer from Georgia, brought greetings to the congress on behalf of the U.S. delegation. The ANAP delegates responded with a standing ovation.

The congress concludes its work May 17, the 39th anniversary of the founding of ANAP.  
 
 
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