Blockade on Cuba Costs
US Economy More
Washington - New
evidence of losses
caused to the US economy
by Washington´s blockade
on Cuba are given in a
letter signed recently
by a dozen leading US
business organizations,
including the US Chamber
of Commerce.
According to author
Margot Pepper, a
Mexican-born journalist
whose memoir about her
year working in Cuba,
Through the Wall: A Year
in Havana, was nominated
for the 2006 American
Book Award, these
organizations urged
President-elect Barack
Obama to initiate the
process of scrapping the
almost half a
century-old embargo,
arguing the cost to the
US is $1.2 billion per
year.
More recent sources,
says Pepper, put the
projected 2009 loss at
$3.6 billion annually in
lost sales.
In addition to the
millions spent by the
Treasury Department in
enforcing blockade
rules, the United States
spends $27 million each
year to broadcast Radio
and TV Marti to what
critics have termed a
black hole, since
signals are effectively
blocked by the Cuban
government.
According to the Council
on Hemispheric Affairs,
this figure reached half
a billion dollars in the
last 20 years.
According to the
non-profit Cuba Policy
Foundation (CPF), the
blockade is causing the
US economy to lose up to
$1.24 billion a year in
agricultural exports
alone, and up
to $3.6 billion more a
year in associated
economic output.
The CPF states that
Arkansas alone is
suffering half a billion
dollars in lost business
annually.
According to the
American Society of
Travel Agents, if the
U.S. were to lift its
travel restrictions to
Cuba, nearly 1.8 million
Americans would visit
the country by 2010.
This could add to US
gross domestic product
by as much as $1.6
billion, the society
says.
According to Johns
Hopkins University, US.
businesses have been
missing out on up to $2
billion in annual trade
with Cuba, a figure
which translates to $1
billion more in lost
trade for the United
States than for Cuba
each year.
In 2002 the Cuban
government estimated the
loss to the Cubans at
about $685 million
annually. A December
2008 report by the BBC
stated that, to date,
the blockade has
cost Cuba $93 billion in
lost revenue since its
introduction in 1962.
No matter whose figures
are used, says Margot
Pepper, the cost to both
countries has more than
tripled in less than
twenty years--something
which neither citizenry
can afford. The fact
that a poor, colonized
country can meet the
basic needs of all its
citizens, underscores
how inexpensive such an
undertaking really is
and could prove
instructive as well to
the president-elect. In
addition to dealing the
United States an
economic blow, the
blockade has deprived US
citizens of Cuba's
medical breakthroughs
such as vaccines for
meningitis B, cures for
retinitis pigmentosa; a
preservative for
un-refrigerated milk and
PPG, a
cholesterol-reducing
drug gobbled up by
foreigners for its side
effect: increased sexual
potency.
The CPF also found that
52 percent of Americans
nationwide say the
blockade
should be scrapped, and
that 67 per cent of
Americans want to lift
the US ban on travel to
Cuba immediately.
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