Cuba

General Information

· Main climates: Tropical Wet and Dry

· Total land area: 11 086 000 ha

· Internal renewable water resources: 34.5 km³

· GNP per capita, 1998: PPP$

· Main food consumed: Sugar & honey, Wheat, Rice, Oil & fat, Meat

· Rice supply, 1999: 69.3 kg paddy/capita/year

Basic Statistics

Producing Zones and Cropping Seasons

Rice is grown mostly along the western coast. The following table shows the harvested areas from different producing zones.

There are two rice-cropping seasons in a year

Production Practices

The following figure shows the harvested areas from different ecologies during 1995-2000 period.

Only 20 to 25 percent of the total rice areas are under rice-rice systems. Land preparation is done either under dry condition (about 20 percent), dry-wet conditions (about 43 percent) and wet conditions (37 percent). Direct seeding is the main method of crop establishment, although a number of farmers are practicing transplanting nowadays. During dry season, seeding is done with seed drill, while during wet season it is done with aeroplane. Majority of rice farms belong to farmers' co-operative or state farmers, the remaining belong to individual households. The following table shows the rice varieties planted in the country.

Constraints and Issues of Sustainable Production

There are several constraints to sustainable rice production in Cuba. Following are the majors:

• Togasodes oryzicolus, Rice Hoja Blanca Virus, Blast.

• Weed and Red rice competition.

• Poor land leveling.

• Degradation of irrigation systems.

• Limited irrigation water supply: about 27 percent of irrigation systems were built with traditional methods, 70 percent with semi-equipped methods, and 3 percent with equipped methods.

• Low soil fertility.

• Salinity.

• Inadequate credit and input supply.

• Low temperature during flowering stage.

Sustainable rice production will require the reorganization of the management of the production system by giving more incentive to individual farmer and the improvement of the supply of irrigation water

Research and Development Institutes

· Ministerio de la Agricultura, 49% 86 y 82 Arroyo Arenas, Havana, Cuba; Tel 441239.

· Instituto de Investigaciones del Arroz, Km 16.5 Autop del Mediodia, La Habana, Cuba

· Instituto de Investigaciones del Arroz, Autopista del Mediodia, Km. 6.5, Bauta, La Habana

· Instituto de Investigaciones Fundamentales en Agricultura Tropical "Alejandro de Humbolt",

· Calle Primera Esq. A-2, Santiago de las Vegas, La Habana, Phone: 2114,

· Instituto Nacional de Ciencias Agricoles, Carretera de Tapaste, Km. 3, San Jose