Throughout the year, national production for both domestic consumption and export was affected due to the fuel deficit and lack of productive inputs. Gil cited other causes as rural labor shortages, low agricultural yields, budget deficits, a decline in supply in the state sector and speculation, as well as the ineffectiveness of measures to curb them.

After there were restrictions on state-subsidized food rations via the ration book called "Libretta" in the fall, the standard food basket for families, which "costs us $1.6 billion," will be one of the country's basic priorities next year, Gil assured . Other priorities include improving electricity generation and fuel availability. In 2023, it was already possible to reduce power outages by 32 percent compared to 2022. Price increases also eased. The number of state-owned companies with losses has also declined, Gil said. However, some of the total of almost 1,950 state-owned companies apparently still often operate inefficiently and at a loss.

Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz added to Gil's statements that the "war economy scenario" must be expected to continue in 2024 due to the US blockade and the international crisis. And further: "We must understand that the resources we can count on in 2024 are those that we produce ourselves." The head of government explained that "in addition to objective difficulties, there are also our own shortcomings" that need to be overcome. Among other things, he pointed out that the decline in foreign exchange income is currently not being offset by a sufficient reduction in expenditure and criticized the failure to effectively integrate non-state activities into the economy. The priority measures for the coming year, according to Marrero Cruz, are aimed at increasing foreign exchange earnings and increasing national production and foreign investment - with a particular focus on food production - in order to achieve a stable supply of goods.

Helpers all over the world

The increase in the number of tourists after the pandemic contributed primarily to the slight recovery in the economy. According to the National Statistics and Information Office (ONEI), 1.81 million visitors came to the country between January and September in 2023, 68.8 percent more than in the same period last year. However, the number in 2019 was almost twice as high. The largest groups came from Canada and the USA (Cubans visiting family), followed by guests from the Russian Federation. After tens of thousands of Russian citizens were forced to cancel trips to Cuba that had already been booked in 2022 as a result of the sanctions imposed against Russia, 120,000 Russian vacationers were able to visit the island again by September of this year, an increase of 77 percent.

In addition to expanding the tourist infrastructure and economic relations with Brazil, Russia, China and Vietnam, Cuba strengthened its contacts with other countries. In June, Díaz-Canel was able to agree new trade agreements with Serbia and Italy during a trip to Europe. He then took part in discussions in Paris on a new global financial pact for the “Group of 77 plus,” which Cuba had been given the chairmanship of in January. In this role, Díaz-Canel also represented the countries of the Global South at a three-day summit of BRICS countries in Johannesburg in August. He had previously signed bilateral cooperation agreements in Angola, Namibia and Mozambique. But the socialist island republic not only looked for trading partners in the world, but also provided internationalist help to other countries - despite its own problems caused by the US blockade. After the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, for example, helpers from the Cuban medical brigade “Henry Reeve” traveled to the affected areas in February.

While Cuba's positive role in the world was highlighted by nearly all speakers at the annual UN debate on the US blockade in November, Washington continues to ignore the global community's almost unanimous call for an end to all sanctions. In doing so, the USA is violating international law, according to an international tribunal that met on November 16 and 17, 2023 at the headquarters of the EU Parliament in Brussels. But despite the worldwide condemnation of their blockade, Washington is trying to achieve its stated goal of overthrowing the Cuban government by force. Unhindered by the US police, an assassin used Molotov cocktails to attack the Cuban embassy in the US capital at the end of September, just a few hours after President Díaz-Canel spoke in the UN General Assembly as a representative of the "G77 plus". In December, Cuban Interior Ministry units arrested several suspects who, in conjunction with terrorist groups in Florida, had planned attacks and other "destabilizing actions" in Cuba at the turn of the year. Foreign Minister Rodríguez accused the US government of “protection and tolerance for those sponsoring acts of terrorism against Cuba in the USA” as “tantamount to complicity”.