Institutional change in Cuba's agricultural sector

Cuba has a low agricultural production and depends on costly food imports. The partial reforms advanced by the government during the 1990s seem to have failed in increasing productivity or output. Due to a lack of primary research in the agricultural sector, little is known about the incentives and constraints that producers face. This dissertation seeks to contribute in the reduction of this knowledge gap and proposes a new way of understanding the transition in the agricultural sector in Cuba. The role of the institutions governing this sector is studied in order to evaluate the main problems of different producer types and the possibilities and constraints of reform towards a more productive agriculture. The dissertation is organized around three papers. The analyses presented in these papers use quantitative and qualitative data collected during two field trips in 2007-2008 and 2009, as well as secondary data from publications, news and official statistics. The first paper describes the sector?s institutional framework and compares the performance of different producer types that include state farms, semi-independent collectives, and private producers. These producers differ in their access to illegal markets, and in their property rights for land and cattle. Private farmers have more incentives to produce due to their stronger user rights, resulting in a better productive performance when compared to state and state-dependent collective farms. The results cast doubt on the prevailing idea that production problems result from technical or resources deficiencies. The second paper deals with the largest producer type described in the first paper, by exploring poverty and food access of collective farm households with the use of principal component analysis and other methods. It is found that relative poverty and food security depend on the household?s access to individual and collective resources for subsistence production. The main productive activities and the economic performance of the state-dependent ...