May 12, 1997

CUBA'S FIRST INDEPENDENT FARMERS' COOPERATIVE ESTABLISHED IN SANTIAGO

SANTIAGO DE CUBA, 5 May (APLO) The first independent farmers' cooperative in collectivist Cuba has been established in Loma de Gato.

Called "Transition" by its members, the coop is made up of independent farmers, according to its president Jorge Béjar Baltazar, who said that the radical step was taken in response to "abandonment" by the central authorities. Ignored by the government, peasants in the region are without the minimal resources needed to work the land or maintain their livestock.

The cooperative has drafted a general development project and is searching for funding sources with which to launch them. At the same time, they will demand that the government suspend all regulations, bureaucratic red tape and coercion which block farmers from doing their work.

Béjar went on to say that they subscribe to the principles of the Cuban Orthodox Renovation Party (PROC), which espouses that the land should belong to the peasants who work them.

Included in the PROC's platform is the launching of an independent farmers' cooperative movement throughout Cuba in order to quickly resolve the chronic food shortages that have plagued the nation since lands were first forcibly collectivized in the sixties. Proponents of this movement will seek international funding and demand that the government suspend all regulations which harm farmers.

"The success of our struggle" said Béjar, "will depend on the understanding and solidarity that we receive throughout the world. We will not give up this work, and we will show plainly that this is the only way Cubans will regain that most basic life-right: to feed ourselves. We appeal to all international organizations, including the FAO, to recognize and support this noble project."

Report: Juan Carlos Céspedes, Oriente Press Agency

Translation: Miguel Casuso, CubaNet