RICE IN THE TIME OF SUGAR

How did Cubas longestablished sugar trade result in the development of an agriculture that benefited consumers abroad at the dire expense of Cubans at home In this history of Cuba Louis A Perez proposes a new Cuban counterpoint rice a staple central to the islands cuisine and sugar which dominated an export economy 150 years in the making In the dynamic between the two dependency on food importsa signal feature of the Cuban economywas set in placeCuban efforts to diversify the economy through expanded rice production were met with keen resistance by US rice producers who were as reliant on the Cuban market as sugar growers were on the US market US growers prepared to retaliate by cutting the sugar quota in a struggle to control Cuban rice markets Perezs chronicle culminates in the 1950s a period of deepening revolutionary tensions on the island as US rice producers and their allies in Congress clashed with Cuban producers supported by the government of Fulgencio Batista US interests prevaileda success Perez argues that contributed to undermining Batistas capacity to govern Cubas inability to develop selfsufficiency in rice production persists long after the triumph of the Cuban revolution Cuba continues to import rice but in the face of the US embargo mainly from Asia US rice growers wait impatiently to recover the Cuban market