Meg Whitefield of the Washington Post reports that members of Cuba’s emerging entrepreneurial sector are fearful of the negative impact on their business of the future implementation of President Trump’s announced ban on individual person-to-person travel to the island.[1]
Here are examples:
- The manager of a Cuban “loose association of vintage car owners who have banded together to offer transportation for visiting dignitaries and other groups” already has received cancellations of reservations and fears for the 20 drivers who depend on these bookings for their livelihood as well as a group of mechanics that refurbish classic cars.
- The husband and wife owners of a Cuban “bed and breakfast for the past two decades have gradually renovated an old mansion that was in ruins when they began, adding guest rooms and struggling to find parts to get the swimming pool filter running again.” They are fearful of having fewer American visitors. The couple also fears the negative impact on “their 17 employees and the private sub-contractors they use to do everything from carpentry work to washing and pressing clothes for guests.” The couple said, “Cuentapropistas (the self-employed) have created a network. We regularly seek out each other’s services to solve our problems.”
Phil Peters, a consultant and president of the U.S. non-profit Cuba Research Center, said most casa particulares are small and won’t be able to handle group travel. “It’s harder if you have 20 people and need to run a scheduled program. You can’t have a tour bus stop at 10 different locations to pick up group members. It’s a little impractical.”
The exceptions, said Peters, “are tourist towns like Trinidad or Viñales where it seems like almost every other house is a casa particular. The three state-run hotels in Viñales, a small rural town near dramatic rock formations and caves, have a combined total of 193 rooms, while there are 1,107 private bed-and-breakfasts, many that have two or three rooms.”
The adverse effects of the future ban on individual person-to-person travel will also be felt in the U.S., according to Sandra Levinson, executive director of The Center for Cuba Studies, which is based in New York and has sponsored educational travel to Cuba since 1973. She said, “Millions are being spent by Cuban Americans who are helping their families in Cuba start their businesses by providing them with the necessary equipment for their startups — everything from bought-in-the-U.S. blenders, ice cream makers, coffee pots, dinnerware, air conditioners, TV sets, leather upholstery for cars, computers, cell phones, sound systems, bedding, shower curtains and more.”
These are important reminders to those of us in the U.S. who oppose this change in U.S. policy. Write your Senators and Representatives to pass the pending bills granting Americans freedom to travel to Cuba.
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[1] Whitefield, Cuban entrepreneurs brace for President Trump’s new Cuba policy, Miami Herald (July 3, 2017) This blog previously has commented on the upcoming negative impact of the ban on individual person-to-person travel on Cuba’s private sector: President Trump Announces Reversal of Some U.S.-Cuba Normalization Policies (June 19, 2017); Cuban Reactions to Trump Reversal of Some U.S.-Cuba Normalization Policies (June 22, 2017); This Blogger’s Reactions to Trump Reversal of Some U.S.-Cuba Normalization Policies (June 23, 2017); Reducing Adverse Impact on Cuban Entrepreneurs of Trump’s Partial Ban on U.S. Person-to-Person Travel to Cuba (June 28, 2017).
