Vol.64/No.11 March 20, 2000
U.S. farmers say 'We went to Cuba to learn how to fight'
{Reporter's notebook column}
BY JAMES HARRIS
HAVANA, Cuba--From February 12 to 18 six farmers from the United States visited Cuba, hosted by the National Association of Small Farmers (ANAP) of that Caribbean nation. The farmers have all been involved in struggles to defend their land against foreclosure and the exploitation they face as independent commodity producers. Several are members and leaders of the Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association (BFAA), which is leading a fight against the U.S. government for widespread discrimination by the Department of Agriculture against farmers who are Black.
The visit was organized in the United States by the Atlanta Network on Cuba, which applied for and received a license for the trip from the Secretary of the Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control. Washington bars most U.S. residents from traveling to Cuba under regulations adopted as part of its embargo of the country. The Food and Development Policy group, also known as Food First, also extended a license it has received to the farmers for the trip.
Saturday, February 12: An important moment for the tour occurred on the first day during our orientation meeting at the ANAP guest house. At this meeting Armando Rama, the head of international relations for ANAP, gave a brief outline of our schedule and the goals of ANAP. Rama is 37 years old and was at age 19 an internationalist volunteer in the Cuban campaign to defend Angola from invasion by the South African apartheid army in the 1980s.
After Rama finished his remarks, Eddie Slaughter gave a presentation on why the group had come to Cuba. The central theme of Slaughter's comments was that the reason they were in Cuba was to learn how to extend their fight and that they wanted to learn how to fight from those who were experienced in fighting the U.S. government. The other theme was the need for farmers to internationalize their struggle, and he wanted to discuss ways to achieve that goal. The other participants introduced themselves and explained their backgrounds and struggles.
Rama listened intently to what was being said. He responded that this was a historic delegation, the first of its kind. He explained that ANAP has relations with many groups but none have come expressing the need to join together in a fight against the U.S. government. We continued the discussion for about another two and a half hours. It was cut short only by the announcement of dinner.
Sunday, February 13: Several different events were scheduled in Matanzas province, mainly in the city of Cárdenas. We attended a small rally by schoolchildren, demanding Elián González be returned to Cuba, where both Slaughter and Codario spoke. We met delegates to an ANAP regional conference who were electing delegates to the ANAP national congress in May, and visited Varadero beach.
The visit to Varadero was not quite what I expected, however. We did not swim. ANAP wanted to show the farmers the two different realities in Cuba. So we went to the beach and heard a presentation by Rama on the pros and cons of tourism, the need for Cuba to earn hard currency, what hard currency is, and the class divisions created by the use of the dollar. It was pretty good, and all the farmers got into the discussion on this aspect of Cuba that they had never really thought about before.
By the time we got back to the ANAP congress, it had long since adjourned and the peasants were celebrating a successful event. It helped us all get a little feel for the mass democratic nature of ANAP. The farmers couldn't help but notice and comment that the 70 or so peasants gathered at the meeting, and those at the party afterward, were their exact counterparts.
At first, the farmers kept asking their Cuban counterparts if it was true that their land could not be foreclosed on. After getting an immediate and unequivocal answer from a number of farmers that they cannot lose their land that question didn't come up any more.
Monday, February 14: We traveled about 20 miles out of the city of Havana and visited the Jesús Menéndez and Augusto Sandino cooperatives. The first is a Credit and Services Cooperative (CCS) and the other an Agricultural Production Cooperative (CPA). Both of these are among the most successful of their type, especially the CPA. We then went to the ANAP training center. As it turned out, in each place the director gave a brief history of the agrarian land reform, as well as a description of their specific work. We had a constant stream of questions and spent a great deal of time in each place. The farmers wanted to know exactly how everything worked--from how the co-op was organized, to different irrigation methods, and methods of disease control. They took extensive notes throughout the whole trip. Willie Head in particular filled two notebooks.
On our return to Havana we met with the president of ANAP, Orlando Lugo Fonte. He also gave us a history of the agrarian reform laws and a rundown on the Elián case. One virtue of verbal repetition is that we can all now give a fairly good outline of the two agrarian reforms, including why the second became necessary, and its results. During the discussion, the farmers presented the ANAP president with a T-shirt and some of the three suitcases of pencils, aspirins, and surgical gloves we had collected. This became our custom in each place, with a different farmer making the presentation each time. This meeting ended up focusing in on the Elián case.
One discussion we had each day was why everything we were seeing was impossible without the Cuban people making a revolution and defending it for more than 40 years. The farmers paid attention to small details and techniques--methods of irrigation, pest control, ways of keeping an old tractor working, etc. They were also greatly attracted to the human solidarity and unity they saw that enabled the Cuban farmers to continue producing with what they described as practically nothing.
One discussion was about plowing fields with oxen, for example. Seeing the use of oxen in Cuba gave rise to various ideas, such as maybe low technology was the way to go. We kept coming back to the fact that this was all possible only because they had made a revolution--that you had to make a revolution--to do any of it.
Tuesday, February 15: We met with a representative of the Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples. Much of the meeting centered on wage differentials in Cuba today due to the fact that some Cubans receive some of their salary in dollars not pesos. Afterward there was a press conference. It was a very successful event. There were about 30 people present, including CNN. It was covered in the Cuban daily Granma, and on Cuban TV. This immediately made the farmers widely recognized, and they were often greeted on the street by people who had seen them on TV or read about them in Granma--especially when they wore their T-shirts.
They revealed themselves as unflinching supporters of the Cuban Revolution, as well as people who hate the U.S. government for what it has done to them and to Cuba. All the farmers on the delegation began to refer to the fight of all small farmers, in addition to the fight of farmers who are Black.
The rest of the day was concentrated on introducing us to various practitioners of organic agriculture, such as a lab that specialized in organic pest control, and a family that is developing methods of food preservation, and making spices at home. They had an amazing garden on a tiny plot of land. The farmers again took great interest in it and extensive notes.
Wednesday, February 16: We visited the Institute of Plant Health and took in a lecture on how it works. Afterward, we went on a tour of what are called gardens in Havana. These are very impressive operations. They are run as cooperatives. The ones that we saw produce quite a lot of high-quality vegetables especially, as well as chickens, ducks, etc. They are operated by peasants and are full-time operations. The term garden does not quite apply to them in the U.S. sense. They are really urban farms.
Later that night, our translator and tour guide, who was a Protestant evangelist, convinced some of the group to visit a church service in Havana. It turned out the preacher was some blow-dried televangelist from Texas. One thing about the visit is that no one is going to tell anyone on our delegation that there is not freedom of religion in Cuba.
Thursday, February 17: We met with three representatives of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba for about two and a half hours. The compañeros who are responsible for following political developments in the United States made presentations, including what they knew about the lawsuit the farmers had lodged against the government. They asked for an update. We were all surprised at how much they knew about it. Slaughter kicked off a report on the current state of the lawsuit, and the need for the farmers to internationalize their struggle. The discussion then went into an exchange on Cuban society in general, with the farmers asking a lot of questions on the history of the revolution.
After the meeting at the Central Committee offices, we had a meeting across town at the Havana Martin Luther King Center, where we met with Rev. Raúl Suárez, the director.
After leaving the King Center, we went directly to the Museum of the Revolution. We only had about an hour to tour it. The hour was one of the tour's high points. The farmers kept saying that we should have scheduled more time for the museum, something that Rama had been urging us all to work to do. We had to be almost literally pushed out of the place.
That night we had a good-bye social. It was attended by our Cuban friends who had worked with us throughout the trip, two supporters from the United States, who were at the Havana International Book Fair, and leaders from ANAP. A high point of the event was the attendance of Luis Morejón, one of the Cuban youth who had come to Atlanta during a 1999 speaking tour in the United States. Morejón had visited the farmers while in Georgia, and his presence provoked quite an emotional response on both sides. It was a nice event.
After the dinner and party Martin Bourke, the director of Food First who had just arrived in Havana to prepare for a delegation coming from the United States the following week, joined us in a trip to a jazz club.
Friday, February 18: We went to a high school about an hour outside of Havana. This is another event that had a huge effect on the farmers for whom education and child rearing are primary issues of concern. The discipline, cheerfulness, general good health, and confidence of Cuban children is a striking feature of the revolution. We were almost late getting out to the airport because once again everyone wanted to stay to take pictures and ask questions.
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