An opening to apps developers? (Updated)

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The February 26 issue of Cuba’s Gaceta Oficial contains a September 2017 resolution from the communications ministry (No. 256/2017) that appears to allow both enterprises and entrepreneurs who are licensed to work as programmers to develop and sell applications under that license, if they apply for a separate permit for that purpose.

I say “appears” because it would be nice to have some coverage in Cuban media or a policy statement that explains the intent. But the resolution’s language is clear, and it looks like a positive step at a time when the wind is blowing in the opposite direction. Cuba’s IT sector is proficient but its commercial activity has been restricted to state enterprises. If this is a recognition of the value of young UCI grads developing apps on their own, then it’s a sign that someone is doing something about a self-imposed obstacle to innovation, economic development, and smart young Cubans staying in Cuba. Let’s hope it continues.

Update: The Ministry of Communications published the resolution here.

Economics roundup

• IPS: Cuban computer science graduates have a hard time finding meaningful jobs in their field.  I wonder how many will propose starting their own operations under the new law that allows private cooperatives to be formed in sectors other than agriculture.

• EFE: Echoing other officials’ statements, Vice President Diaz-Canel says the hard part of the reforms is yet to come.  He described the purpose of the reforms as eliminating the “prohibitions that have held back productive forces.”  More here from Nick Miroff.

• Café Fuerte: Etecsa once again reduces the initiation fee for cell phone accounts, to 30 CUC.  Before the cuts began in 2008, it was 120 CUC.

• Reuters: Venezuelan opposition leader Capriles would end subsidies to Cuba.

• CubaEncuentro: Economist Carmelo Mesa-Lago looks at the opaque Cuba-Venezuela economic relationship and concludes that if it is curtailed or ended, the blow to Cuba would be “powerful” but not as severe as the loss of Soviet-bloc support and trade two decades ago.

• Reuters: Following last year’s deal on commercial debt with Japan, Cuba struck a deal with Russia over the island’s Soviet-era debt.

• The average income in Cuba is $20 per month…that’s a constantly cited statistic that accurately describes the average state salary.  But it doesn’t describe reality.  Many who work in the state have other sources of household income, and many (in hard currency-producing industries and in joint ventures) have higher incomes.  Increasing numbers of Cubans, in agriculture and small enterprise, don’t work for the state at all.  AFP examines the impact of this income on consumption.

The cable seems to be working

On the company blog of Renesys, there’s a post indicating that the Cuba-Venezuela submarine cable is finally being used.  The writer’s hunch is based on his finding that Telefonica has just joined the three satellite providers that were handling Cuba’s Internet traffic, and the speed (latency) of transmission has improved.

Odds and ends

• Dow Jones:  The “Section 211” case, named after a 1998 law that invalidated Pernod-Ricard’s registration of the Havana Club rum trademark in the United States, came to an end in the U.S. Supreme Court.  Pernod lost and, cutting its losses, announced the “Havanista” trademark for a Cuban rum that will enter the U.S. market when the embargo ends.  Cuba’s foreign ministry, citing a WTO decision in Pernod’s favor, continues to call on the U.S. government to register the trademark.

• Politico on the voting propensities of younger-generation Cuban Americans.

• EFE: University admissions in Cuba are down 26 percent, the national statistics office reports.  In today’s Granma, a story on the priority being given to technical education.

• Trabajadores: In large numbers, Cubans are updating and registering the titles to their homes, and in spite of the streamlined process government workers are straining at the workload.  A clean title is prerequisite to any sale or transfer of a property.

• AP on the “mystery” of the undersea fiber optic cable that connected Cuba and Venezuela last year and seems not to be working.

• The New York Times looks ahead to the promised reform of Cuba’s migration norms.

• AP: A Cuban official tallies the distribution of idle state lands since 2008: 1.5 million hectares to 163,000 producers, with 79 percent of that land now in use and 59 percent being used for livestock.

• Governor Romney issued a Cuban independence day statement charging that the late Damas de Blanco leader Laura Pollan died “at the hands of the dictatorship.”

• At Huffington Post, coverage of Café Laurent, a great new Vedado paladar.

• The New Yorker rounds up some of its Cuba coverage over the years, including dispatches from the island in the 1960’s and 1970’s.

Odds and ends

• On the eve of the Cartagena inter-American summit, Colombian President Santos said “it doesn’t make sense” that Cuba is not included in these meetings, and he sees a “degree of hypocrisy in the way [the United States] treats Cuba and does not apply the same standard to other countries.”   

• Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff says there is a “consensus that this is the last Summit of the Americas without Cuba.”

• From papal biographer George Weigel, here’s a critique of the way in which Pope Benedict conducted his visit to Cuba.

• The Wall Street Journal on Cuban activists’ use of Twitter via cellphones and those who add funds to their cell phone accounts from abroad, an activity supported “in the past” by USAID, and perhaps still.

• The Herald on Cuba’s new entrepreneurs in Santiago.

• IPS has an interesting report on how foreign assistance projects die in the Cuban bureaucracy.

Odds and ends

• Granma excoriates those Cubans who set up illegal satellite networks and sell access to them, noting that arrests have been made and networks broken up. The article mentions DirecTV and Dish Network links, which sounds like the well known black-market TV operations. It also makes some less-than-clear claims that the United States is financing some of this, including a network that provided international telephone service through independent wireless networks, which sounds like something else altogether. See also AFP English.

• EFE: Cubans account for one third of those granted asylum in Spain in the past year. A comment on this article complains about the dissidents who came with many family members, received benefits, and “in the end complained to international news media that no one helps them here [in Spain] and they are worse off than in Cuba.”

• The Cuban Communist Party’s Lineamientos (economic and social policy guidelines) in (unofficial) English translation, courtesy of Mr. Marce Cameron, president of the Sydney (Australia!) University Cuba-Venezuela Solidarity Club.

• NPR on the new market for cars in Cuba.

• CNN on the expanding flight service to Cuba.

• A Vanity Fair slideshow of photos of Michael Dweck from his book Habana Libre.