Sponge Farms – New Source of Bounty from the Sea

In a Cuban village thrashed by heavy sea swells and reliant on increasingly depleted fish stocks, the farming of sponges is emerging as a strong alternative for income and development.

CLIMATE CHANGE: Health at Risk

The impacts of climate change on human health will require new approaches to development, based on mitigation and adaptation programmes in line with policies that ensure equal access to health care.

CUBA: Fewer Storks Visiting Shiny Maternity Clinics

Women in Cuba cite a variety of reasons to explain their decision to have only one child, ranging from the housing shortage to the rising cost of living and the many work responsibilities they have to shoulder. But many say that if things were different they would have a bigger family.

CUBA: Food Security Focus of New UN Programmes

Three new international cooperation agreements channeled through the United Nations system in Cuba are aimed at strengthening food security, especially in the poorest parts of the country.

ECONOMY-CUBA: Cutting Subsidies to Balance the Budget

Cuban President Raúl Castro is willing to risk unpopular measures to free the state from its excessive burden of subsidies and for-free services, as part of a programme to adjust public expenditure to shrunken government revenues and balance the budget.

CUBA-US: Mixed Messages

While the Cuban government has intensified its protests against the U.S. embargo, typically hostile signals between the two nations have been mixed with hints of a more relaxed tone since U.S. President Barack Obama took office.

CUBA: Raising an Environmentally Conscious Generation

Every summer in Cuba, the complaint is heard over and over again: "These beaches are filthy!" Empty beer and soft drink bottles, plastic bags and cups, the remains of someone's picnic lunch, and innumerable cigarette butts are strewn on the sand every day, despite the threat of fines and the pleas of ecologists.

CUBA: Restoring Historic Santiago for Its People

Even with her house practically in ruins, Isabel García wouldn’t dream of living anywhere else. She’d rather stay where she knows that no matter what corner she turns she’ll always be able to gaze out into the blue sea or raise her eyes up to the green mountains that shelter her beloved city of Santiago, in eastern Cuba.

ENVIRONMENT: Cuba Encourages Ecotourism in Largest Wetland

The Zapata wren (Ferminia cerverai) is known in Cuba as the "soprano of the forest" for its lovely song. But this tiny bird is very timid and, at the slightest sound, will hide in the vegetation in the Cienaga de Zapata - Zapata Swamp - 160 km south of Havana on the island’s south-central coast.

Cuba Encourages Tourism in Its Largest Marsh

One of the most important wetlands of the Caribbean, Ciénaga de Zapata in Cuba, is throwing open the doors to tourists interested in nature.

CUBA-US: ‘Embargo as Usual’ Flies in the Face of Int’l Opposition

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez complained that the U.S. embargo against Cuba has remained intact under the government of Barack Obama, who he said has "a historic opportunity" to eliminate the "obsolete" and "unacceptable" blockade in place for nearly half a century.

POLITICS-CUBA: Moderate Dissident Group Convenes Congress

A moderate dissident group in Cuba that aspires to become a "political majority" in the future announced Thursday that it would hold a congress in 2010.

CUBA: Scientists, Farmers Fighting Climate Change – Together

Cuba is facing the challenge of boosting agricultural output under difficult climate conditions and on soils badly deteriorated by erosion, salinity and other problems. And scientists have a strategic role to play, provided they do not sit in their laboratories but get out into the fields where the action is.

CUBA: Raising Awareness about Racial Discrimination

Intellectuals and artists concerned about continued racial discrimination in Cuba are attempting to revive the Cofradía de la Negritud (CONEG), a "brotherhood" or association of black people aimed at raising awareness of the problem.

CUBA: El Niño Taming the Hurricanes

The cyclical climate phenomenon known as El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in the equatorial Pacific Ocean this year is helping weaken cyclone activity in the Northern Atlantic and the Caribbean. But Cuban meteorologists are warning against complacency.

POLITICS-CUBA: Wanted – Socialist System that Meets Real Needs

Cuba's communist government is being challenged to move toward a more participative and inclusive socialist system, one that offers real economic well-being and responds to the social and political demands that have built up and been expressed in different ways in recent years.

El Niño Taming the Hurricanes

The arrival of El Niño is good news -- for now -- in the countries of the Americas located in the hurricane zone, including Cuba.

CUBA: Compulsory Rural Boarding School on the Way Out

Without fanfare or major explanations, the Cuban government has begun to dismantle the system of mandatory rural boarding school for students in the last three years of high school – one of various reforms aimed at improving the quality of education that will start to be implemented at the start of the next school year in September.

CUBA: Fullest Possible Social Inclusion for the Disabled

Arnoldo Ramón Virgilio’s legs are of little use to him, but he has a way with words that more than makes up for any physical limitations. He’s one of the outpatients at the "América Labadí Arce" Medical and Education Centre, which provides health care and rehabilitation for the disabled in this city in eastern Cuba.

ECONOMY-CUBA: New Budget Cuts in Store

The impact of the global financial crisis on the economy in Cuba was a major focus of a speech Sunday by President Raúl Castro, who confirmed that further "adjustments" will be made to this year's budget.

CUBA-US: Frosty Relations No Bar to Communication

Cuba and the United States are poised to resume talks on migration issues any time now, although the five Cuban agents imprisoned in the U.S. remain "a formidable obstacle" to normalising bilateral relations, according to Cuban parliament president Ricardo Alarcón.