Organics and pesticide reduction in Cuba

摘要

This comprehensive account looks at the dramatic changes during Cuba's 'special period' in the 1990s following the collapse of the Soviet Union, when food, fuel and agrochemical imports plummeted, threatening national food security. While numerous books have described Cuban organic agriculture and urban food production programmes as the most notable responses to the input crisis, this book examines changes in practice, policy and attitudes, analysing the perceptions of different farmers and state agencies and asks how far the country has really turned its back on synthetic agrochemicals. Contrary to some external reports, there was no governmental policy for all agriculture to become organic and agrochemical use continued in both large and small farms, state-run, cooperative or individual, albeit in far lower volumes than before. Larger urban vegetable production units, for example, sometimes used low levels of insecticides, although the Plant Protection Authority's national standard for urban agriculture prohibited pesticide use unless authorised by technicians from the local urban agriculture centres. Neighbours acted as watchdogs to report unauthorised use.