The article refers to members of a U.S. delegation that attended the congress. This group, sponsored by the Atlanta Network on Cuba, included seven farmers and two workers: Basu, an organic vegetable farmer from Illinois; Lee Dobbins and Willie Head, farmers from Georgia; Francis Goodman, Randall Jasper, and John Kinsman, dairy farmers from Wisconsin; Linda Joyce, an airline worker from Atlanta; Dexter Randall, a Vermont dairy farmer; and Maggie Trowe, a meat packer from Minnesota.

In an accompanying article in that issue of Granma International, headlined "Erasing 40 years of lies," reporter Raisa Pages interviewed these visitors on conditions facing U.S. farmers and what they had learned in Cuba. The interview took place during a recess in the ANAP congress.

"U.S. land is being monopolized by large companies very quickly," said Randall Jasper, according to the Granma International article, citing figures that show how small farmers in the United have been driven off the land over the decades. Dexter Randall of Vermont stated that "many farmers have gone bankrupt because of the low prices imposed by the transnationals, and do not have medical insurance."

Willie Head explained the additional discrimination faced by farmers who are Black. He "pointed out that because of their color, they are left out of the agricultural market and are faced with a greater threat of losing their land."

John Kinsman stated that "in his country you can ignore the laws if you've got enough money in your pockets." Head added, "It is not democracy; the laws protect the rich."

Lee Dobbins noted that Washington acts similarly on the international level. He told Granma International, "It's a national shame how the United States proclaims itself the most important country on the face of the Earth, but at the same time forces other nations to pay for its actions. Our capitalist system consists of politics of force and racist policies."

Maggie Trowe, a unionist and leader of the U.S. Socialist Workers Party, told Granma International that not only farmers but workers face problems in the United States. "We demand free medical insurance for all workers," she said, "and participate in protests to demand our rights" that are under attack by the employers and their government.

Because of their experiences resisting this exploitation and oppression, the U.S. farmers expressed great interest in seeing Cuba for themselves and meeting Cuban small farmers who explained how, through their revolution, they have won the right to the land and are free from the scourge of debt, discrimination, and foreclosures. "They noted that it was very interesting to see how low-cost, organic family farming is promoted in Cuba, where the government guarantees the land, the market and other facilities," the article reports.

Dobbins and Basu "noted that cultural as well as economic exchange is needed with Cuba," arguing for eliminating barriers to communication and exchange between people in the United States and Cuba.

"They concluded by saying that they have a big job ahead of them to erase so many years of lies about Cuba in the United States, and then they went off quickly to continue their contacts with Cuban campesinos."

The Militant published an article on the ANAP congress in its May 29 issue. In the June 26 issue it also reported on a June 3 Militant Labor Forum in Chicago featuring participants in the U.S. delegation to the Havana meeting.  
 

In these times of low world sugar prices, the Cuban government has doubled the price paid to farmers raising this vital export crop, in order to stimulate greater yields.

Orlando Lugo Fonte, president of the National Association of Small Farmers (ANAP), which held its 9th conference recently in Havana, emphasized to the 800 delegates from all around the country that the example of sugarcane is by no means unique.

The state has also increased the prices it pays farmers for pork, beef, honey, coffee, milk, and various vegetables, in order to increase production of these products, reduce the level of imports and improve the population's nutrition.

The demand for the materials used by the 63,000 farming cooperative members, the 150,000 small farmers, and the 25,000 who cultivate lands in usufruct is still exceeding the available supply. Some materials are purchased abroad and then sold to farmers in national currency. This policy means that they are not subject to the vagaries of the international markets.

Cooperative worker Juan Ibarra works in an association based at the foot of Turquino Peak in the Sierra Maestra mountains. His lands are at the highest altitude of any cultivated in Cuba. He told Granma International that the machetes used to weed the coffee plants often don't arrive until they are almost completely overgrown by weeds. He added that many years have passed since his cooperative has received the wire needed to make animal compounds.

Ibarra, like many other farmers, is conscious of the fact that resources are scarce and that prices have risen on the international markets. He also knows that the [U.S.] blockade of the island interferes with the timely arrival of materials, but like others, he points out various deficiencies in the distribution of the little that is available.

Minister of Agriculture Alfredo Jordán pointed out that it's very difficult to make contracts for buying and selling one by one, with over 150,000 individual small farmers.

That situation will improve in the medium term, as many farmers have modernized their collective organizations by designating administrators to act on their behalf. In the case of credit and service cooperatives (CCS), the administrator represents them in their dealings with the state, without any fear that they will lose tenancy of their lands.

Lugo said that 1,248 of the 2,500 CCS organizations that exist in the country have already designated a company or administrator to negotiate the viability of production contracts with the state and also deal with banks and other institutions.

However, in many places the old time-consuming tradition of making contracts with each individual farmer still exists.

Arranging production contracts and merchandising goods are the two most difficult areas for the Ministry of Agriculture and it is asking for a more demanding attitude and attention from farmers in meeting the production agreements between the two parties.

Sometimes, a little too much benevolence exists on the part of the state representative in fixing the amount of production that the farmer must sell to the state, in line with the resources he has received and the potential of his lands, while in other cases the farmer doesn't meet his production targets.

Mutually high standards are necessary on both sides, emphasized Jordán and Lugo.

The agriculture minister recognized that the biggest difficulty in assigning resources is where a varied range of crops are produced. He recalled that at the beginning of the special period, the availability of fuel dropped by half. Where one million tons of fertilizer had previously been available, it is now only possible to buy a little over 100,000 tons.

He added that although there are now fewer resources available, conditions have been created to extract more benefits through a system aimed directly at stimulating both production and economic efficiency.

The problems don't always originate from lack of resources, he said. Sometimes they arise from imperfections in control and organizational structures.  
 
Perfecting distribution
Even though many Cubans complain about high prices in the farmers' markets, especially in the capital, the majority are in favor of continuing to allow them to operate freely alongside controlled distribution systems. The complaints stem from the fact that prices are maintained at a high level in relation to workers' incomes.

The farmers' markets, with their supply and demand culture, are administered by the Ministry of Domestic Trade. A new option, the so-called minimarkets, which have low fixed prices [mercados topados, or capped markets] and are the responsibility of the Ministry of Agriculture, has now been inaugurated in order to improve competitiveness.

The prices in the new minimarkets are fixed in each province or municipality of the country in agreement with the local administration, the Provincial Administrative Council of People's Power. The prices set take supply and demand into account and farmers and cooperatives are able to directly attend in order to sell their produce.

One problem, however, is that the tax liabilities are identical in both types of markets and farmers always have to meet these tax obligations as well as their production agreements with the government. There are also some local governments that don't allow farmers to sell their produce in the location they desire, as a result of legislation.

Carlos Lage, secretary of the Executive Committee of the Council of Ministers, called for an examination of the subject aimed at identifying and eliminating all of these problems to ensure that there is maximum participation by farmers in this new type of sales.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture, 2,800 minimarkets with fixed prices have so far been opened across the country. However, fewest advances have been made in the capital, since it's impossible to open more sales centers if sufficient produce doesn't remain after guaranteeing controlled distribution to the kitchens of schools, hospitals, nurseries, and work centers,

Manuel Millares, minister of finance and prices, said that in the first trimester of this year more than 36 million kilograms of produce had been sold in the farmers' markets with a declared value that has risen to 297 million pesos.

However, over the same period, over 133 million kilograms of produce had been sold in minimarkets at fixed prices, with a total value of 199 million pesos. A comparison between these two sets of figures demonstrates the lower level of prices that prevail in minimarkets. He said that taxes would be reviewed, since they should not be the same in the two forms of markets.  
 
Sugar production levels set to increase
An analysis of sugar production levels showed that currently the average is very poor. The farming policy that applies to cane sugar cultivation was explained by Minister of the Sugar Industry Ulises Rosales del Toro. He said that intensive technology was now being applied to the harvest, which would both increase yields and gradually free up 250,000 hectares [617,500 acres] of land which can be used for other crops.

Cuban Vice president Raúl Castro recognized that deficiencies exist and called for an increase in production to satisfy both the needs of the population and of tourism.

The farmers asked to have their retirement age brought into line with other workers, since at the moment cooperative workers have to wait five years longer than other workers.

Raúl replied that the retirement ages must be equalized and said that this had been one of the problems that had caused some farming cooperative members to change careers and work in other sectors.

For all Cuban farmers, the free medical and education services brought by the Revolution have been a natural and logical part of life ever since 1959. But while that has happened in this small and poor island, U.S. farmers like Dexter Randall and Randall Jasper, of Vermont and Wisconsin, told Granma International that they had lost their medical insurance coverage in the same way as many others who have gone bankrupt lately in the United States.

When you hear the anecdotes at the farmers' conference from those who lived in Cuba during the time of capitalism, you realize that sometimes these huge social advances we enjoy have become so natural to us that we almost forget them.  
 
 
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