Photo: Revolution Studies.

"We must recover everything that the Revolution has developed in relation to the countryside," reflected the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, during the session of the Council of Ministers corresponding to the month of January.

In rural communities —the Head of State highlighted during the meeting, which was led by the member of the Political Bureau and Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz—, there are little schools, medical offices, social circles, warehouses and other spaces for the benefit of the population, while programs and projects have been developed to attend to the particularities of this scenario and the people who live there that need to be recovered in order to begin to change those places.

Their criteria were shared prior to the highest government body approving in the work session the ideas contained in the document Revaluation of rurality in Cuba, a program that, among other objectives, seeks to promote, as part of municipal development strategies , local projects that promote new jobs, provide resources and distinguish training possibilities for the population that lives in rural communities.

In rural areas, Díaz-Canel pointed out, there is a fundamental component of our cultural identity, in its broad expression of historical roots;

"There is a cultural wealth, an idiosyncrasy and elements of cultural identity."

Precisely there, the dignitary said, is where one of the primary sectors of the Cuban economy is developed, which is everything that has to do with the productions that start from the use of natural resources, mainly the soil.

And for it to fulfill that function, he stressed, we must promote it with technology, research, innovation, training and formation of the qualified labor force, and seek incentives so that this qualified force finds space and development in those places.

The Cuban President spoke about comprehensively reviewing everything that has been done in the Cuban fields, who meant in his words that an important part of the agricultural polytechnics that exist in the country are located precisely in rural areas, specialized educational institutions to promote the training of the skilled labor force.

Hence his insistence on the need to recover —gradually and to the extent possible— existing infrastructures, especially health, education and social, as well as the provision of many services that not only provided solutions to demands from the population in the communities, but also became a source of employment.

As a matter of total priority, it considered the development of agricultural production and self-supply programs in the localities to support the demands for food in the communities.

Only by rescuing things that were done in the countryside, he said, we can give an immediate change, without many resources, to the issue of rurality.

“It's a management and salvage problem,” she emphasized.

For this reason also its emphasis on achieving the inclusion of these actions in the territorial and local development strategies, in which the desired state of the communities must be foreseen and how to achieve it, taking into account the economic, social and ideological components.

He also insisted on the importance of promoting agroecology;

the mini-industry;

as well as the use and delivery of the lands in usufruct, elements that must be considered in the conception of attention to rurality.

In his words, he emphasized the need to extend experiences with social transformation projects in urban communities to rural areas;

“everything we are doing in the neighborhoods, which has given us results, which has involved a whole group of actors, which has opened up hope, and has had the participation of people in solving problems, these concepts, there are to take them to rural communities as well.”

All of this, he emphasized, requires a political guarantee that corresponds to the Party in each place, together with the work of the mass organizations that work in the rural area and must have a governance system so that what is approved today is followed as a comprehensive and systematic care project.

Rural communities, essential in the development of the country

Take advantage of existing potentialities and opportunities and in correspondence move towards technological change, from the innovation of productive processes in agricultural and agricultural activities;

diversify economic activity, strengthen social services and ensure inter-municipal articulation, creating productive chains that close cycles;

rebuild identity and cultural patterns of the rural, in accordance with the characteristics of each region, rescuing traditions, values, practices and infrastructures with good taste and culture of detail;

as well as promoting the socioeconomic competitiveness of rural areas so that they become spaces of opportunity for the existing young population,

The issue, of high importance for the nation, motivated a broad debate among those present, who agreed on the priority with which all the designed actions should be worked.

Although there are elements that "we cannot solve immediately, due to the conditions that the country has", having a line of action that is included in development strategies will allow us to make progress in solving this problem, he valued. Deputy Prime Minister Inés María Chapman Waugh,.

Similarly, Deputy Prime Minister Jorge Luis Perdomo Di-Lella placed special emphasis on the importance of recovering infrastructure in rural communities and creating more and more possibilities for young people to carry out their life projects in the communities.

It is necessary, he pointed out, to design specific strategies, in accordance with the characteristics of each zone, to solve these problems to the extent that resources allow it, and he emphasized communications and the purpose of achieving greater connectivity.

When speaking at this point on the agenda, the Minister of Agriculture, Ydael Pérez Brito, stated that the situation that is manifesting itself today in rural areas is partly an impediment to achieving faster implementation of the Food Sovereignty and Security Law Food and Nutrition, since the stability of the labor force in the field is one of the main factors that prevents greater production.

Associated with this, he explained that actions are already being carried out in several communities, which has allowed production to recover and transform the environment: workers' homes and access roads are improved, services are expanded, among other actions.

Taking into account the studies carried out to design the actions that will be undertaken, which include the reorganization of schools in rural areas of the country, the Minister of Education, Ena Elsa Velázquez Cobiella, considered them "very appropriate", and referred to to what was done jointly with the Ministry of Agriculture to, from a perspective work in the communities, open schools where sustainable enrollment can be achieved.

After an extensive debate about the challenges presented by the issue of rurality in Cuba and how much the agreement adopted by the Council of Ministers can contribute to consolidate the social and economic transformations that are needed in the Cuban countryside, the member of the Political Bureau and Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz emphasized that this Program must have support from all the country's structures to achieve its objectives.

We cannot see this as just another plan, Marrero Cruz appreciated, even acknowledging the material difficulties that exist, "we have to deal more with the Cuban countryside, with the Cuban peasantry, with rurality in the broad sense of the word."

In this regard, he commented on the need to achieve stability in the workforce;

that when young people leave the field to study, they return to it to apply their knowledge;

develop housing plans;

improve accessibility to communities, and many other aspects that demand prioritized attention and constant monitoring of all the country's management structures.

Take advantage of everything to produce food

Focused essentially on how to take better advantage of the potential of the countryside for the country's development, the meeting's agenda also included an evaluation of the state of compliance of the projects for forage protein plants for animal consumption, which was presented by the director of the Center for Research in Protein Plants and Bionatural Products, María del Carmen Pérez Hernández.

According to his assessment, despite the progress observed in this Program, plantings are still insufficient and producers and businessmen do not fully understand the importance of further promoting the use of these products.

Among the actions that have been proposed to be carried out in the course of this year, Pérez Hernández pointed out the consolidation of the 30 seed farms and the implementation of an Innovation Management System in the intervention scenarios, centers for developing females and producers. with more than 10 cows, for your prioritized attention.

In this regard, Deputy Prime Minister Jorge Luis Tapia Fonseca highlighted the importance of the work that has been organized from the municipalities to the national level, which has been creating conditions to achieve greater progress in the recovery of livestock in Cuba, which is a program “goes beyond protein plants”.

Summarizing this issue, the Prime Minister highlighted the significance of this Protein Forage Plants Program, closely linked to improving food security and the health of the population.

The projects that are developed from it, he recalled, are a continuity of the ideas and thoughts of the Commander in Chief, to which Army General Raúl Castro Ruz gives special follow-up.

We, he stated, have to achieve the objective of expanding these productions more and more, "now more than ever, due to the need we have to substitute imports" for animal feed.

A better 2023 from all spaces

At the end of the meeting agenda, valuable analyzes were shared about the discussion process with the workers of the Economy Plan and the State Budget for the year 2023, which began on the 15th and should end on March 30.

This process, emphasized Ulises Guilarte de Nacimiento, general secretary of the Central de Trabajadores de Cuba (CTC), is not informative, it has to lead the bosses to encourage the group of workers to determine what their potentials are, based on their capacities. productive and current regulations, which will allow your company to increase and diversify its offers.

It is important, he emphasized, that workers have the possibility of expressing their ideas, this cannot be a space just to listen to figures, often technocratic, that do not illustrate anything and in practice do not favor the debate of the issues that are really being discussed. they should evaluate.

Hence his emphasis that the reports cannot start from the material deficiencies we have and external obstacles, since they are elements that are already known.

He pointed out that the purpose of the discussion with the workers is to find how, with collective intelligence, we find ways to overcome these obstacles -which are objective and are there, but which are not going to change in the immediate term-, and from our own effort , raising productivity, applying more science and technology, this group endorses the plan and incorporates the commitment to comply.

Regarding the budgeted sector of the economy, Guilarte de Nacimiento commented that, among other issues, it has already been discussed with global organizations how to reduce the budget deficit that is so high that we have;

how to channel actions to control the use and destination of spending;

how to boost income;

and how to combat the avoidance behavior that exists in a group of places.

And in all this, he stressed, the role of the bosses is key, who have the responsibility of offering their workers the confidence and arguments to be able to move the economy forward.

After recalling the essential ideas that were shared during the recent tour of the country's top leadership throughout the national territory, the Prime Minister considered that the conception that has been given to these assemblies is also a way of doing things differently to achieve a better 2023.

The key to the success of what we have proposed, he reflected, is the change of mentality of the bosses, who the first thing they have to do is become more closely linked to the workers.

It is time to make collective decisions, and despite the complex scenario we are experiencing, it has been shown, he said, that things can be done differently, that companies can get out of the loss if they are run by people with a different mentality, entrepreneurs, who are capable of listen to their workers and add that collective intelligence in order to find solutions to problems.

So, he stressed, these assemblies are key, and "the main bosses have to be in them, not only listening, but motivating, asking questions", and the more concerns the workers have, the more we debate them, the more we socialize them.

Finally, Marrero Cruz valued that “the best proposals to do something different, to make those changes that we need, will come from these groups, from the experts that we have in our own group.

So this process is not just to support him, it is to fully participate in each of these meetings.”