Cuba`s Joint Ventures Are Doing Just Fine

As many as 342 active joint ventures operating in Cuba -a considerable chunk of them clustered in the travel industry- churned out $147.6 million in gross earnings for the island nations coffer´s in 2003, weekly periodical "Business in Cuba" reported.

According to the latest issue of the publication that cites yearend spreadsheet figures reckoned by the Ministry of Foreign Investment and Economic Cooperation (MINVEC is the acronym in Spanish), estimates for the ongoing year are hovering around $200 million and counting.

The weekly magazine labels 2003 as a "decisive year for the strengthening of foreign investment and economic cooperation in the country," and points to $6 billion worth of foreign capital that are already committed on the island.

Aside from markets, capital and technology, foreign investment has positive ripple effects on other sectors of the Cuban economy. The publication also underscores the fact that joint ventures are buying nearly 60 percent of all consuming products from local producers as the Caribbean country reaps 70 cents for every dollar spent in business activities.

As we speak, Cuba is holding joint ventures with Spain (98 partnerships in all), Canada (52), Italy (51), France (15), Mexico (11), China (10), the U.K. (9), Germany (9) and Panama (8).

In a sector-by-sector breakdown, foreign joint ventures are mostly covering such fields as basic industries (64), tourism (56), building (47), agriculture (21), non-heavy industries (20) and food processing (16).

Other sectors that benefit from foreign partnerships are information technology and telecommunications (13), heavy industry (13), transportation (12), sugar industry (11) and other areas.