We
keep hearing from people in Cuba that they thought some things would improve
with the new financial reforms, but for Cuban people products are no more
available, and no easier to find than before. Those with young children, especially those with special
dietary or medical needs, continue to struggle to find the needed products.
Yoani
Sanchez posted a story about the issue, called “Wholesale vs. Retail” In
her article, she says, “I have the impression of being trapped in a permanent deja
vu, in a reality where phrases, complaints and situations are almost exactly
repeated. Today at noon I heard on the street words identical to those of last
week; the neighborhood brooding over problems very similar to those of two
decades ago, and at the butcher’s a long line seemed modeled on another of 1994
or 2002. It’s hard to shake the feeling that we have already lived this, of
having fallen into a loop that brings us back, over and over again, to the same
point we’ve already passed before. One of the recurring scenes is the pursuit
of food and other basic products chronically in short supply in our markets.
Going after a little oil, a package of sausage, or a piece of soap to wash
clothes.”
The
following photo was posted by a Havana resident to try find needed dietary
products for his child.
Yoani
explains as well that the new business people don’t have a way to purchase
their products wholesale, o they are competing with consumers in buying
products at retail.
Yoani
continues, “The long-awaited reform that allowed the rebirth of self-employment
has generated some problems that are barely talked about. Lacking a wholesale
market where they can buy supplies and raw materials for their small
businesses, private workers have turned to the already weak retail network.
They line up at dawn outside the bakeries and certain shops to acquire large
quantities of merchandise that end up in restaurant and snack bar kitchens.
Without any special discounts for buying in quantity, maintaining a supply of
vegetables, grains and meats becomes a harrowing task, difficult and extremely
expensive. In addition, they significantly decrease the availability of
products for the non-industrial consumer, the individual shopper whose needs
are only for home use. The retail majority.
The feeble State commerce is not
prepared for the demand of recent months. Thus, it seems almost impossible to
sustain over the longer term a coexistence between the private sector and the
inefficient supplies from official companies. If this contradiction isn’t
resolved, the time will come when pork, peppers and potatoes can only be found
on the plates of paladares — private restaurants. And the neighbor who
complains today, for the umpteenth time, about the absence of toilet paper,
will have to visit the bathrooms of the new restaurants to remember what those
rolls were like, so white, so soft.”
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