Cuba has approved a far-reaching programme of economic reforms, marking one of the most significant shifts in the country’s state-led model since the 1959 revolution.
The package, adopted unanimously by parliament on Thursday, includes 176 proposals covering private and state-owned companies, agriculture, tourism, banking, taxation, wages, foreign investment and the foreign exchange market.
Prime Minister Manuel Marrero presented the measures to more than 400 lawmakers, who approved them by a show of hands in a vote broadcast live on state television.
The changes come as Cuba struggles with severe shortages, power cuts and a deepening economic crisis, worsened by long-standing US sanctions and renewed pressure from Washington.
A wider role for private business
Among the measures approved are plans to allow some state companies to be transformed into private shareholding or partnership-based entities. Private firms with more than 100 employees will also be permitted, expanding a sector that had already grown since 2021, when Cuba allowed small and medium-sized private companies for the first time in decades.
More than 10,000 such firms now operate on the island, employing around a third of the active workforce.
The reforms also open the door to foreign capital in the private sector and allow individuals to hold accounts in foreign currencies. Sectors previously dominated by the state, including agriculture, tourism, banking and foreign exchange, will be opened further to domestic and foreign private investment.
Cuban citizens will be able to own a private company while also holding stakes in others. Business-level wage negotiations will also be allowed.
Daniel Toralbas, a Cuban economist based in London, described the package to AFP as the deepest economic reform programme announced in the country’s 70 years since the revolution. He said the measures were not cosmetic changes, but a significant attempt to expand the role of the private sector in Cuba’s economy.
Political control remains unchanged
The reforms do not challenge Cuba’s one-party political system, dominated by the Communist Party, and no timetable for implementation has been announced.
President Miguel Díaz-Canel said after the vote that the aim was to correct mistakes while defending socialism.
The Communist Party’s Central Committee had approved the package during an extraordinary meeting on Wednesday. Díaz-Canel acknowledged that there had not been full consensus on every measure, but said some decisions could no longer be postponed.
Raúl Castro, the 95-year-old former president who continues to wield influence inside the party, also made clear his support for the changes.
Cuba has experimented with limited openings before, but without abandoning the foundations of central planning. After Fidel Castro’s revolution in 1959, large Cuban and foreign private companies were nationalised, followed by smaller businesses, including family-run enterprises.
Crisis and US pressure
The reforms come at a moment of intense pressure on the island. Cuba has faced an American embargo since 1962, while the Trump administration has pursued what it describes as a policy of “maximum pressure”.
Over the past five months, Cuba has also been hit by a fuel blockade, pushing the economy closer to collapse and aggravating shortages of food, fuel, drinking water and medicine.
Washington has made clear that it wants to see a change in Cuba’s economic model, if not its political system.
Asked at the White House about the possibility of US military action against Cuba, Vice President JD Vance said on Thursday that relations could improve if Havana made “smart decisions”.
For Cuba, the vote signals an attempt to loosen parts of the economic system without loosening political control. Whether the measures can stabilise the economy, attract investment and ease daily hardship will depend on how quickly, and how far, the government is prepared to implement them.
Source: AMNA
