Havana Economy

The economic development of Havana was due largely to its geographical location, which became a major commercial node of the New World. From the beginning, the city found a source of enrichment in the sugar industry and the slave trade, and later when Cuba won its independence, it became a famous resort. Despite the efforts the government of Fidel Castro was committed to bringing industrial production to all corners of the island.

Havana remains the center of a large part of the national industrial production. The traditional sugar industry, which for three centuries the island’s economy has sustained and which now controls three-quarters of its exports, is distributed in other locations. But in Havana, there are many concentrated facilities of light industry, packaging of meat products and chemical and pharmaceutical industries.

Other important industries located in Havana are the food-processing plants, shipyards, vehicle assembly plants, production of alcoholic beverages (particularly rum), textiles and snuff products, especially famous cigars, a product international renowned. Although the ports of Cienfuegos and Matanzas have developed under the revolutionary government, Havana remains Cuba’s main port with 50% of import and exports passing through the city. This port also supports a considerable fishing industry.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the strengthened U.S. embargo against Cuba, Havana and the rest of the country experienced its worst economic crisis since the triumph of the revolution in 1959. This crisis is officially called the Special Period in Peacetime.

The effects of the Special Period and consequent food shortages have more serious implications in the city of Havana. This city with a population of some 2.5 million people (about one fifth of the total population), is the largest city in the Caribbean. Besides the decline in food production needed to supply the Cuban capital, Havana is also suffering a shortage of petroleum necessary to transport, refrigerate and store food provided by the rural agricultural sector.

Havana has been designated as a priority of the National Food and urban agriculture has been one of the measures taken to increase food security in the city. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Cuba again revived the tourism industry, which is currently the main economic source of Havana and throughout Cuba.

Also in the 1980s they built on the west of the city, scientific institutions in the biotechnology sector, which exported high value added products such as medicines, equipment and vaccines that compete with counterparts in more developed countries in this sector. The city has a rising service sector, having established branches in everything from cars such as Peugeots and Mercedes-Benz, as well as famous fashion brands such as Dolce & Gabbana, Zara and Benetton, which has revived old commercial streets such as Boulevard San Rafael, Galiano or Calle Obispo.