A new, liberated and revitalised Cuba has become known as the tourism island of the Caribbean. A country has high-quality health service for export or a promised land when investment laws see change. After four years of implementing updated policies, Cuba is now changing dayby day.

Cuba’s policy to update the new economic model was approved at the fourth National Party Congress in April, 2011. Mr. Pham Tien Tu, Former Vietnamese Ambassador to Cuba, said that the main target of the policy is similar to Vietnam’s innovation target on thought, economic structure and liberation of productive forces to develop social productive strength, making more wealth and improving people’s lives. At the same time, cultural and spiritual lives are also improved.

A new life

A small grocery with an area of just over 10 square meters was set up in Pedro Pi town. Despite the exclusivity of being the ‘one’ grocery store in the locality with only an occasional customer or children playing on the street outside , the grocery is considered as a development model of small private business model and the sign of ‘real’ change..

40-year-old Ormile Lores Lores Rodriguez is an accountant at the Grito de Baire cooperative farm. She said that the farmers’ salary has been improved and they will be rewarded quarterly if achieving the set target.

For Mrs. Tammy, the happiest moments lie ahead when she will meet her relatives after 50 years of separation and they can visit friends and relatives much more conveniently.

Tourism hit record high

Tourism is the second spear-head industry after high-quality health service export. Over the past 50 years, American people could not visit Cuba to enjoy the beautiful beaches or famous salsa dance because of the frozen relations between the two countries. Cuba’s area is equivalent to the US’s state of Ohio but it owns nine UNESCO World Heritage sites, more than the Republic of Dominica, Bahamas, Jamaica and Puerto Rico combined.

A Caribbean island country with huge tourism potential , 145 kilometers (sea route) from the US, or an approximately 30 - 45 minutes flight each way create convenient travel opportunities for US travelers.

Regarding tourism, according to the Cuban Ministry of Tourism, in 2014, about 3 million tourist arrivals visited Cuba, up 5 % in comparison to 2013. Of this, about 18,000 arrivals were American tourists.

“In the first half of the year, American tourists to Cuba increased about 50%. If the trend continues in the rest of the year, this is will be a significant improvement for the country’s tourism sector,” Omar Everleny, a Cuban tourism expert said.

The world’s most attractive investment law

With the guideline of attracting foreign investment to speed up domestic production, Cuba’s National Assembly approved a new foreign investment law, dated from June 28^th, 2014 with new points.

On the occasion of the 32^nd La Havana International Fair (FIHAV) in early November 2014, the Cuban government focused promoting and drawing foreign investment in Cuba in general and in the Special Economic Development Zone of Mariel (ZEDM) in western Laha Bana in particular. According to the ZEDM office, so far, enterprises from 36 countries and territories have registered investment in the zone with the biggest registration number from Spain, China, Italy, Russia, France, Brazil, Mexico and Canada.

Cuba enhanced budget use for investment and made equal distribution on all fields. However, the priority was made towards some fields such as investment for service production (up 57.1% year on year) and infrastructure (up 17.7%). Specifically, 99-year land hire is one of the most attractive point in the country’s investment law beside increasingly improved infrastructure.

A mass of big countries and economies is forecast to invest in Cuba in the near future.

Surge in remittance

In the last days of 2010, the Cuban government and the US reached an agreement with the Western Union Group to remove tax on remittance sent from the US.

Earlier, when receiving remittances from the US, Cuban people had to pay a 10% tax rate to exchange for CUC (Cuban convertible peso). A representative from Western Union Group affirmed that right after the agreement came into effect from December 20^th, 2010, remittance from the US to Cuba surged sharply.

According to the US Department of State, remittances from the US to Cuba reach about USD2 billion a year and the figure will increase by four times after the US officially eliminates every trade embargo. Growth in the remittance will help accelerate investment capital and aid from the private economic sector in Cuba.

Mr. Pham Tien Tu said that many Cuban people were living overseas with about 1.5 million in the US and 0.4 million in other countries. Earlier, Cuban people who lived in exile only sent about USD600-1,000 a year to the homeland but now they can send USD2,000-4,000 a year. Specifically, almost all Cuban people have relatives in the US.

For Cuba’s four-year update policy, an expert in Cuba said that liberated productive forces helped the economy grow 1.2-3.5% from 2011 to 2014 with the GDP growth rate in the first six months of 2015 reaching 4.67% and tourism growth posting 50%. Overseas national currency exchange and trade saw gigantic growth and people’s lives were improved. Specifically, in 2014, the Cuban government focused on checking, supplementing and enforcing many regulations to enhance management in every field.

Some new social policies were enforced to improve people’s lives, in particular a policy to increase workers salary’s with the health sector anticipating a sal rise of 255% for doctors, dentists and other positions. The adjustment came into effect from June 1^st, 2014 and 440,000 workers have benefited from the policy./.

( Compiled by VNF )