Havana. – Spring is in its splendor. From the High Puntal Window at Ángel David’s house, 46, a graduate in Tourism, the branches of a flamboyan that throws red and orange flowers by forming a multicolored tapestry on the sidewalk can be touched with their hands. May’s rains have matured the mangoes and the smell of coriander spreads through the patio. The birds trinate and a cat sleeps the nap while David watered the grass with a hose.
The six -hour blackout breaks the charm of nature and the heat of lead causes a jet to sweat. Ángel David connects a rechargeable fan, drinks water from a plastic knob and spreads in a armchair as if the Everest had conquered. On the wall of the room hangs its university diploma and a master’s degree in business administration.
For fourteen years, Ángel David worked as a marketing specialist at the Ministry of Tourism. “They threw me because the bosses did not like. He said things that they did not like to hear. I refuted their optimistic forecasts based more on the desires than in reality. I always emphasized to develop more than beach, health or nature tourism. I knew it was impossible to compete with other destinations of the Caribbean, such as Punta Cana or Cancun, if triumphalist speeches and the economic matrix were not changed.”
It was Obama
“When the Obama stage, the Cuban rulers were convinced that eight or ten million American would do tourism in Cuba annually. They were unfounded calculations, but betting on tourism was not an error of the regime. The ruling was to invest only in a sector and practically abandon the rest of the sectors. The great problem that state institutions have is that they base their economic and political strategies on hypothetical scenarios.
“The entire National Development Program is mounted in the alleged context that Cuba and the United States normalize relationships. Following the shy openings of Raúl Castro, such as the sale and purchase of houses and cars, access to mobile telephony, that citizens could rent rooms in hotels and travel abroad, retrograde regulations, the government was believed that these measures were the non plus ultra of modernity and that the businessmen would come Running to invest in the island and the White House would repeal the embargo, they would take them out of the list of countries that support terrorism and the United States Congress would approve to include the island in the group of nations with a favored treatment. ”
“So, in any of the meetings that you participated, you realized that these people – the dictatorship – does not have their feet on the ground. They have never understood that a negotiation is Quid Pro quo (something in exchange for something). His ego is so exaggerated that they consider that they do not have to change or offer anything. The issue of human rights, respect for political differences and freedom of expression gives them rash. They believe that Cuba is at the same level as China or Saudi Arabia that are dictatorships and maintain relations with the United States without too many questions. ”
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“That has been his mistake. Believing that the United is the one who has to forgive and grant, not them. Fidel Castro was the first to put the leg. He opted strong for tourism, he planned that it would be the country economic matrix and invest in exporting more nickel and other minerals, biotechnological products, software and services “.
“For the ruling brave, agriculture, livestock and fishing were things of the past. And as the Communist Party is so uncompromising and only hears itself, having a planned economy that they use as a religious mantra, we were committed to failure. From the construction of the port of the Mariel -which at some point believed that it would be very important -, the extraction of oil in the gulf, the extraction of oil in the gulf in the gulf. The only nation with technology to do it is the United States, dollarization and plan tourism based on the future arrival of millions of American tourists, I realized that wisdom is a bad word for people who have always given orders. “
“It is what happened with tourism and other branches of the economy. Its calculations have been superficial and wrong. You cannot conceive a tourist destination with travelers locked in a hotel, for not having an extra-hotter infrastructure suitable for visitors. Considering the opposite, streets with giant dump Travelers want to come to Cuba.
“From 2017 to date, tourism on the island has fallen almost 60 percent. While the Dominican Republic in 2024 received more than eleven million tourists, Cuba barely reached two million. After the pandemic, the annual forecasts drawn by the Government have been breached. And this year is the terrible: international tourism fell 29.7% in the first quarter of 2025 and 75 percent of the hotel rooms They are empty.
Losses, no benefits
Gustavo, an economist, believes that “for five years tourism is leaving more losses than benefits. The gross currency entrance did not exceed 3 billion dollars in the time of fat cows, when we received 4 and a half million tourists. Dominican, with the same percentage, raises more than seven billion dollars. In Cuba, in the last five years, tourism entered gross between 600 and one billion dollars. Economic crisis, industrial decapitalization and collapse in agriculture, for every dollar that is spent between 70 and 80 cents on buying supplies for tourism, since you have to import sugar, fruits, vegetables and other foods that do not occur in the country.
“The profit margin in this five years fluctuates between 300 and 400 million dollars. The export of medical services generates eight times more currencies. And the remittances raise three times more than tourism. The government does not publish that data so as not to recognize its failure. Despite these low income, the government continues to invest decompiest In the construction and repair of hotels.
The figures for the profitability of tourism show the lousy management of the sector by the military dictatorship. The locomotive that would boost the Cuban economy a long time ago.
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@Desdelahabana
