Cuba for the first time asks UN for urgent aid to provide milk for children

Rapidcreek@lemmy.world to World News@lemmy.world – 121 points –
Cuba for the first time asks UN for urgent aid to provide milk for children
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Lack of milk in Cuba, a recurring problem, unlike most all caribbean countries

I wonder if there's anything different that would cause it to be harder for them to import things.

No. Food doesn't fall under the embargo.

Yeah, food which can only be traded for with cash. Which is in short supply because there are some sort of restrictions on Cuba's ability to trade commodities and raw resources for cash.

It’s in short supply because Cuba doesn’t have much worth trading. I have no issues lifting the embargo but in return, they have to allow anyone to leave who wants to leave. There would be a mass exodus the minute they did that.

If it's purely because they don't have much worth trading then why not lift the embargo and give them access to world trade, banks, and resources again? What's the harm?

They do for the most part. The embargo is the United States. I have never said I support the embargo. It’s an old archaic Cold War policy.

The US embargo also affects other countries. They don't let ships dock at Cuba and then the US, for example. The reason they get oil from Venezuela is because they're also iced out of much of the world market by US through sanctions.

Also, the US is 80 miles off the coast of Cuba and huge. Them not being available to trade with Cuba is a huge disadvantage.

Ask the average Cuban if they rather have the embargo lifted or be able to leave the country

Communist countries don't handle these things well.

They don't. I doubt any of these people have been to Cuba. I have. Food shortages are common there even though they can buy food from the United States. I suspect these are currently hold-over issues caused by COVID. They receive a fair amount of their hard currency through tourism which was shut down during covid. As an American, it is a pain to go to Cuba but food is readily available for tourist. For the locals, not so much.

Yup. You don't want to tell the young socialists here about Cuban ration books, it might destroy their fantasies

I find it odd some may glamorize a brutal dictatorship where people are living in fear. Everywhere you go there is law enforcement and military. The citizens are very careful what they say because they fear being dragged to prison. When I went as a tourist. Someone asked what my house was like, the tour guide cut me off and said like most Americans, he doesn’t own his own, they don’t have running water and indoor plumbing.

Umm. I have three homes which I own. Four cars and I’m not eating flint corn. We have funk grocery stores.

Turns out she was pretty pro-American as she had been there but the government pushed an anti-American agenda.

If cuba wasn't under sanctions, the playing field would be level. Yet you still blame it on communism as if it's the only reason.

And they still wouldn't have enough milk.

Then why the embargo? Surely communism would ruin the country enough on its own and they could just lift it...

There's no embargo on food

There's an embargo on literally everything else that makes it hard to get food, including they have difficulty even transferring money, or getting the parts and machines to grow their own food, or oil to run them.

Not at all. Nice try though. If you want to buy them milk, the barges leave the US twice a week. I'm sure they'll appreciate it.

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