Cuba: Eggs Also Disappear from Trade
Colombia is rushing to the rescue, with a shipment of half a million eggs about to arrive, which is unlikely to radically change the situation
It has resisted for decades thanks to generous aid from the Soviet Union, but now the Cuban economy is beginning to collapse. Following flour and fuel, eggs disappeared from the market. The Havana government has raised a cry of alarm, to which only neighboring Colombia has responded so far, announcing that it has sent two shipping containers with a cargo of 518,400 eggs to the “island of freedom.”
Colombia’s aid, of course, will not be able to compensate for Cuba’s dramatic food shortages, while Russia, which for its part is suffering from an unprecedented decline in egg production, is forced to import the product from Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Iran. The Director General of the Colombian Agricultural Institute (ICA), Juan Fernando Roa Ortiz, said that Colombia has not been affected by avian influenza and Newcastle disease, which guarantees conditions for biosecurity for the poultry sector.
Havana estimates that Cuba’s egg production fell by 50% last year, and poultry production on the island is currently at 50% of its nominal capacity.