Rationing in Cuba
Rationing in Cuba refers to the system of food distribution known in Cuba as the Libreta de Abastecimiento. The system establishes the rations each person is allowed to buy through that system, and the frequency of supplies.
Despite rumors of ending, the system still exists. As of 2012, a coupon book taken to a ration shop provided family minimums for rice, sugar, matches, and oil, above the average wage of £15/month. On top of rationing, the average wage at the end of 2005 was 334 regular pesos per month and average monthly pension was $9.
More strenuous rationing on food and other basics was imposed in May 2019 due to the country's economic problems, caused partly by a stiffening U.S. embargo and the loss of aid from Venezuela.
Overview
The vast majority of Cuban families rely, for their food intake, on the Libreta de Abastecimiento distribution system, instated on 12 March 1962. The system establishes the rations each person is allowed to buy through the system, and the frequency of supplies. Most of these products are distributed at the local bodega, and in the case of meat, poultry or fish, at the local carnicería. Other industrial products are also included in the libreta, such as cigarettes, cigars, matches and cooking fuels. Other products can also be distributed through this method, such as light bulbs and other home supplies.Products included in the libreta vary according to age and sex. For example, children below 7 years old are provided 1 litre of milk per day, as are the elderly, the ill, and pregnant women. Adults above 65 years are entitled to different allowances, as well. Granting a special diet requires presentation of a medical certificate which confirms the health condition and what product requirements this condition has.
A Government office, specially created for this task, the OFICODA, distributes the libreta to all citizens each year, in the form of a small booklet. This booklet contains pages indicating the exact number and age groups of persons composing the family nucleus, as well as any dietary indications. A person's products are distributed only at the bodega that serves their area of official residence. A person cannot receive their products somewhere else, so each change of address requires returning to the OFICODA to update the booklet's data, and those living away from their registered addresses have to return to the previous area for their supplies.
Products distributed through the libreta mechanism are sold at subsidized prices, which have been kept more or less stable since its inception. The libreta contains a page for every month, where the clerk marks what products were withdrawn, and in which quantities. Cubans are required to present the libreta each time they buy the rations.
At its inception, the rationing system included not only food products, but industrial products as well. Along with the libreta, a tear-off coupon booklet was distributed, whose purpose was to set the allowances for industrial products, mainly clothing, shoes, and home products, as well as rationing the toys sold to families with children. After the demise of the Eastern Bloc in 1991, Cuba entered the "Special Period" and industrial products were no longer distributed through this system.
A specific set of laws regulate the functioning of the system, as well as establishing penalties for its misuse. Most irregularities deal with clerks not recording products in the booklet, or recording them incorrectly, and the weighing of the products distributed. Citizens could be legally liable if they do not promptly inform the local OFICODA of any changes in the composition of the family nucleus.
Standard rations
A table follows that illustrates the standard ration distributed through this system. Figures are per person, per month. An indication of the subsidized prices is given, as well. Allowances vary from year to year, so these should be understood as approximate figures, based on data from 2000:Meat products are distributed separately, if available, following a different rationale. These are distributed every 15 days, and usually rotate. Fish, beef, ground beef, chicken, sausages and ham fall in this category. Quantities, and prices, differ for each meat product.
It must be said that distribution is not always prompt, and product delivery is frequently delayed. Such delays are most evident in beef distribution. The fact that products are not available at the bodega always, but arrive in a more or less random manner, creates long queues when products arrive, which sometimes makes buying the products a quite lengthy process. So, this required a mechanism to be invented so that people with special needs, such as old persons and pregnant women, had precedence on the queue. This mechanism became known as Plan Jaba. Jaba is a word for a flexible basket or bag taken from the vocabulary of Neo-Taino nations and originally was made of dried woven strips from palm fronds.
It was estimated in the early 2000s that the rationing covered between one third and one half of a family's needs.
President Raul Castro moved to eliminate many products from the rationing system, including potatoes and peas.
Government justification for the rationing
The Cuban government states this method of distribution serves to ensure each citizen a minimum intake of food, regardless of the person's social and economical status, and has publicized plans for its demise. It also stresses that the libreta is not the only means of acquiring goods available to a Cuban citizen, as these and other products are freely available on the mercado libre and mercado paralelo, and of course in the numerous supermarkets and stores that sell goods in convertible pesos or euros. The prices in the ration book are about 20 times lower than the free market. It says as well that humanitarian aid received from other countries is distributed through this method in a fair and equitable manner. The official stance on this subject is that of being undesirable, but unavoidable and fair.The government also says that rations are not used for political leverage, and distributes the subsidized food equally to all citizens, regardless of their political views or judicial status. However residents and refugees from Cuba report that their rationing books were taken away when they were perceived to be anti-revolutionary.
Criticisms
Detractors question the fairness of this method as well as its purpose, and stress its deficiencies, such as a historical decrement of the delivery frequency and quantities of goods distributed and, in their opinion, this method creates profound economical differences within the Cuban people, dividing the country in half: those who can afford the higher prices of goods in convertible pesos or in the mercado libre, and those that simply cannot.They stress, as well, the fact that the measure was adopted by the Cuban government in 1962 as a temporary palliative to a crisis and has lasted for more than fifty years.