14ymedio, Madrid, 1 March 2024 — It has been two days since the Spanish agency EFE released the news that Cuba had asked, for the first time in history, for help from the United Nations World Food Program in the face of the milk shortage, but the Government still does not say a single word. This Thursday, the Minister of the Food Industry, Alberto López Díaz, gave a press conference to reassure the population that children up to to seven years old are guaranteed powdered milk in the coming days, although the explanations were confusing.
The arrival of a Brazilian ship with 375 metric tons of the product “guarantees the distribution” for that group for an unspecified number of days. The minister also cited several contracts that add up, if the figures are correct, to 1,750 tons of powdered milk. He added that, since the country consumes 2,000 tons per month for children, medical diets, pregnant women and “social consumption,” these imports “guarantee stability in the distribution for March and April.”
The figures weren’t released immediately, but it was striking to begin with that, among the imported products, are 500 tons coming from the United States, “by virtue of the exceptions established by that Government to sell certain products to the Island, through immediate payment and in cash.” Although the authorities have recognized that they are allowed to buy certain products from the U.S., denouncing at the same time that the conditions are anomalous in international trade, they rarely refer to a specific acquisition through the exemptions from the embargo, in force since 2001.
He added that, since the country consumes 2,000 tons per month for children, medical diets, pregnant women and “social consumption,” these imports “guarantee stability in the distribution for March and April.”
The other contracts cited by the minister and disclosed by the official press consist of another 500 tons from Brazil, 245 tons from Canada and 600 tons from “other suppliers.”
López Díaz said that the problem is being progressively solved thanks to the “interest of the country’s top management in such a sensitive issue,” and stressed that powdered milk is marketed at high prices in the international market. Residents of Villa Clara, Sancti Spíritus and Camagüey were more fortunate, he said, since there were no “affects” in these territories because they have fresh milk available.
The shortage of milk became more pressing last year, when almost all
