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Yahoo! Mon Sep 16, 3:14 PM ET
HAVANA (AP) - Fidel Castro said Monday at least 90,000 former sugar workers
will return to school to be trained for new jobs amid a vast restructuring of
the island nation's sugar industry.
Speaking during an assembly marking the start of the school year, Castro
said the workers would receive "a decent salary" during their
schooling.
Castro provided no specifics, but Sugar Ministry officials have said the
former workers would receive between 300 and 1,000 Cuban pesos a month during
their training.
At the current exchange rate, that figures out to between $11 and $38
dollars a month, but is still higher than the average government salary of less
than 300 pesos.
Sugar Minister Ulises Rosales announced earlier this year that about 100,000
of the nation's 420,000 sugar workers will leave the cane fields and be trained
for new jobs.
Announced four months ago, the plan to reorganize the sugar industry calls
for closing 70 of the Caribbean nation's 154 sugar processing plants while
maintaining an annual production of more than 4 million tons of sugar cane.
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