By El Toque
HAVANA TIMES – The Cuban government has acknowledged that it will only be able to address 50% of the damage to roofs of homes caused by hurricanes Oscar and Rafael, as well as the earthquakes on November 10, 2024.
During a meeting on November 17, the Minister of Economy and Planning, Joaquin Alonso Vasquez, reminded that, in addition to the damages caused by these natural disasters, there are still cases of people affected by weather events in Pinar del Río (Hurricane Ian in 2022) and Guantánamo (Hurricane Matthew in 2017).
In contrast to the limited resources allocated to the repair of damaged homes, the tourism sector is recovering quickly, with the goal of being ready in the first days of December to receive tourists for the high season of 2024-2025.
This was confirmed by Juan Carlos García, the minister in charge of the Tourism who assured Granma newspaper that “the country and the Cuban economy” need the vitality of the hotel industry. Although he acknowledged that they will not meet the target of 3 million visitors in 2024, they are focusing their efforts and resources on improving services for tourists.
Fewer Tourists, More Hotel Investment
Although tourism in Cuba is practically the only one in the region that has not recovered since the 2019 pandemic, the government prioritizes what it calls “the engine of the economy.”
Despite the low occupancy rate – 28.4% in the first half of 2024 – resources have not been allocated to the recovery of other important sectors, such as agriculture or energy, nor to public services like health and education, despite daily reports of poor conditions in schools and hospitals.
Economist Pedro Monreal reported that “from 2020 to June 2024, investment primarily associated with tourism (the sum of ‘hotels and restaurants’ and ‘business services and real estate activity’) averaged 38.9% of the country’s total investment, compared to 9.4% for investment in electricity, gas, and water.”
The Canadian tour operator agency Sunwing, one of the largest sources of vacationers to Cuba, eliminated 26 hotels from its offerings on the island due to quality issues.
Samantha Taylor, the head of marketing, told Pax News that the hotels did not meet the expectations of what guests truly wanted to experience and acknowledged that prices had risen while quality had declined.
Regarding the loss of trust among Canadians in Cuban tourism, she mentioned that they had received cancellations and complaints from clients because the infrastructure did not meet expectations.
“What does a five-star hotel in Cuba mean? What’s to expect at a three-star hotel? What we see in our customers’ comments is that Canadians want transparency in what they are receiving. They don’t want surprises,” said Taylor.
Quality Issues Known to Cuban Authorities
Problems related to the quality of offerings are well known to Cuban authorities. Tourism minister Garcia stated that, to improve the conditions and services, “they created wholesale tourism provider companies, some of them with 100% foreign capital.”
Still, clients maintain questions regarding the quality of state-run tourist services, and some agencies suggest booking tours and trips through private businesses, which also guarantee electricity with generators and honestly explain to tourists what to expect from their trip and what they need to bring.
According to Travel Weekly, several agencies acknowledged that cancellations remain minimal but qualify the current moment as one of the worst for tourism on the island.
Recently, the Minister of Tourism Juan Carlos Garcia told the Tass news agency that soon there will be hotels on the island built and managed by Russian companies, or others that will be managed by Russian entrepreneurs. Currently, there are 18 foreign hotel chains managing properties in Cuba.
It seems logical that the Cuban government would focus on Russian tourists (the second-largest source of visitors in 2024) when countries like Canada, France, or the UK advise their nationals not to visit the island due to power outages.
The promise of the marketing director of the Ministry of Tourism, Giana Galindo Henríquez, to guarantee backup generators for hotels is not enough. She told Tass that the impact of the nationwide blackout on October 18, 2024, was minimal in the sector, but it led to tourists being relocated to hotels with electricity service.
The Spanish tourism-focused media outlet Preferente published that “tour operators, grouped in Seto, an industry organization, have shown their absolute concern because telephone communications and the Internet network are very unstable.”
The report acknowledged that, despite government efforts, the recovery of normalcy in Cuba is no longer in the hands of the government.
One month after the first total blackout, Lessner Gomez, director of the Cuban Tourism Office in Toronto, assured that 100% of the hotel facilities in Cuba had electricity.
Another point contrasting this information is that hospitals have suffered critical moments due to issues with their energy generators during extended power outages.
Homes vs. Hotels
According to preliminary data, more than 46,000 homes were affected by hurricanes Oscar (late October) and Rafael (early November), as well as the earthquakes on November 10, 2024. The majority of the damage was to the roofs of homes, and nearly 18% were total collapses.
While many of the affected people are currently living in tents donated by international organizations, the Cuban government is focusing on its 80,000 hotel rooms.
On several occasions, social media users have asked the government to use hotel facilities for the evacuation of people at risk due to natural disasters.
However, evacuations to the homes of friends and family are becoming more common. During Hurricane Oscar, for example, more than 70% of evacuations were carried out in the homes of acquaintances.
With blackouts lasting 12 hours or more across the country, homes with collapsed roofs, people who have lost almost everything due to natural disasters, and a population that takes to the streets every day to find food, the government is focused on attracting tourists and offering them new experiences.
The image in the cities is repeated: dark and impoverished streets, lit only by luxurious hotels that most Cubans cannot access.
First published in Spanish by El Toque and translated and posted in English by Havana Times.
Read more from Cuba here on Havana Times.
