Interview granted by Miguel Mario Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic, to Ignacio Ramonet, Spanish professor and journalist, at the Palace of the Revolution, on May 11, 2024, “Year 66 of the Revolution."

Ignacio Ramonet: President, first of all, I would like to thank you very much for your kindness in granting us this interview.

This is going to be an interview of about ten questions that we are going to divide into three blocks: one block devoted to domestic policy, to the domestic situation in Cuba; a second block on the economy, essentially the economy in Cuba, obviously; and a third block on international policy.

The first question then on domestic policy is the following:

For many families in Cuba for a short time now, two or three years, daily life has become particularly difficult: there are food shortages, there is inflation, and there are shortages in public services. The economic, commercial, and financial blockade illegally imposed by the United States already existed, and I would like to ask you what has happened in recent times for things to have deteriorated in such a way.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Well, Ramonet, first of all, I thank you for allowing us to talk to you, it is always very interesting to be able to share points of view with you and also to hear your comments on these issues. And you asked me a very interesting question because many people ask why, if there has been a blockade for so long, what is it that distinguishes the current blockade?

I think we have to start from the fact that, in the first place, today the blockade has a qualitatively different characteristic; today we are talking about a tightened blockade and this tightening is supported by another component, which is the inclusion of Cuba in a spurious list determined at will by the US government of countries that supposedly support terrorism.

Above all, I am going to make a comparison that I think is the best way to illustrate what changes from one moment to another, if we compare what life was like for Cubans until 2019 or until the second half of 2019, and what life has been like after the second half of 2019, which is what also frames or differentiates these two moments.

In the first place, we are a country that has suffered the limitations and adversities imposed on us by the blockade for more than sixty years; an illegal, unjust, anachronistic blockade as a policy and loaded, above all, with an overbearing perspective of the Government of the United States.

Cuba has never stood idly by and we have developed a capacity for resistance. I would even say, after the experiences we had in COVID-19, that it is a creative resistance, because the country has not only been capable of resisting the onslaught of the blockade; but the country under these conditions has advanced, has contributed, has grown as a nation and has developed; in other words, it is not just resisting and doing nothing else.

Under all these concepts and all the strategies of the Revolution we have been able to maintain a certain level of economic activity, exports, support to social programs with a high impact on our population and we have lived, although our dreams have been stopped or all our aspirations slowed down, precisely because of the effects of the blockade, which I categorically tell you is the cause that slows down our economic development the most. And I always say: if we have been able to do so many things blocked, what would we not have been able to do without being blocked; but these will be hypotheses that have to be turned into theses with studies, with verifications, with data analysis, which is not the case of what concerns us now.

In 2019 this country received income from exports from our exportable and competitive productions in the international market because there was a vitality of the country's economic activity; the country received a significant amount of remittances; it received notable income from the tourist activity -remember that we had almost four and a half million tourists in a year-, and we had credits from several financial institutions, government credits from countries with which we have very good relations and also credits from programs, from agencies, which allowed us to elaborate and support projects.

On the other hand, we had a stable supply of fuel based on the agreements with friendly countries, with brotherly countries, which meant that under those agreements we did not have to spend practically nothing of the foreign currency income we received on fuel, because all that had a compensation based on the services we provide to those brotherly countries.

Therefore, under all those conditions we had foreign currency income that allowed us to import raw materials to develop our main productive processes to the extent that we could have those things with the limitations of the blockade; we could buy food to satisfy the basic food basket, we could even buy food and other goods that we put in the stores - at that time they were the stores that operated in CUC, and in the domestic market in national currency - therefore, our domestic market had a certain level of supply.

We had foreign currency available with which we could achieve a legal exchange market, controlled by the State, where we could buy and sell foreign currency with its equivalent in local currency. We had an acceptable level of capacity to pay our debt obligations with countries or with companies that had invested in Cuba, even with foreign investment. We also had a capacity of money for the purchase of spare parts, one of the most important inputs for our economy.

Therefore, there was a supply in the domestic market and there was an adequate supply/demand ratio that allowed inflation levels to be low.

All this caused a feedback loop: the productive processes, a good productive activity gave more exportable funds, more income; tourism developed, gave more income, and all of this was being revolved and we reached a certain situation, I would say, of stability, without yet achieving the prosperity to which we aspire, and we are in a process of perfecting our economic-social system, and, on the other hand, also with a whole group of proposals, visions, postulates and guidelines in relation to the National Plan for Economic and Social Development until 2030, and we lived in that way.

Ignacio Ramonet: That was until 2019.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Until the second semester of 2019.

In the second half of 2019, the Trump administration applied more than 240 measures that tighten the blockade, and this is where the first concept comes in: They tighten the blockade, and even Title III of the Helms-Burton Act is applied for the first time, which had never been applied before and which achieves a tremendous impact, above all, of pressure on foreign investors, on those who have already invested, on those who were thinking of investing, and it gives all the support to those who were part of the confiscations that the Revolutionary Government justly carried out in the first years of the Revolution.

With these toughening measures, all our sources of foreign currency income are suddenly cut off; tourism decreases notably because the United States Government denies the right of the American people to do tourism in Cuba; the cruise ships, which were an important part of the influx of tourists to Cuba, are closed; an enormous energy and financial persecution is organized. More than 92 banks or international financial entities are sanctioned or pressured by the US Government, for which reason they have ceased their financial exchange relations with Cuba.

Remittances, which were an important source of income for the country, have been cut off and, on the other hand, they have also pressured and applied many sanctions against friendly and brotherly countries that supplied us with fuel on a stable basis. Therefore, we began to have a fuel deficit; we began to have a deficit in the availability of foreign currency.

With these two elements, on the one hand, the national electric power system is destabilized, because we are able to guarantee the operation of the thermoelectric plants with domestic crude oil; but the thermoelectric plants do not cover all the country's electricity demand, especially at peak times, and we have to start up other distributed generation plants, which operate mainly with diesel and fuel oil; since we do not have these fuels, we are left with a deficit.

On the other hand, since we had less availability of foreign currency, we could not buy in time the necessary inputs and spare parts to maintain the entire national electric power system, which, in addition, is a system with a certain level of obsolescence; this increases breakages, causes maintenance to be extended and all this conspires against the stability of the national electric power system and, under these conditions, we began to suffer from the annoying blackouts. To reduce these blackouts, we even had to close or limit a little the level of productive activity, a group of economic activities.

Therefore, this will give us the first impact that at the peak of the day we can have the distributed generation groups not working and we can cover everything with this new energy. 

Ah, because one of the elements that I forgot to explain to you is that as the thermoelectric plants stop working, the energy distribution groups that are planned, especially for peak hours, have to work at off-peak hours, therefore, they wear out more than what they were planned for and they do not always manage to compensate that deficit.

We have a whole program, which was explained by the Minister of Energy and Mines a few weeks ago to all our population. We are now starting to successively set up and enable parks, and our electricity generation will grow by this means, that is to say, there will be a substantial change this year, and a consolidation next year.

Part of these photovoltaic energy parks will accumulate energy, therefore, they will be able to be used in the evening hours. In addition to giving us this possibility, it will reduce the fuel consumption used for this purpose.

Ignacio Ramonet: Which is used to produce.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Here there are two ways out then: we will be able to devote more fuel to the economy, especially to food production, to agriculture, to productive processes which today are very limited because most of the fuel we have, as it is in deficit, we use it for electricity generation; and, on the other hand, our fuel purchase expenses will also decrease.

Ignacio Ramonet: On the purchase of hydrocarbons.
Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: But, in addition, thermoelectric plants will work in a more comfortable regime, therefore, we will consume less of our own national crude, which is also exportable; and one of the things we are doing, of the measures we have taken, is to take a group of steps to continue increasing the production of national crude, with that production of national crude we can export, and it also helps us to have a source of financing for all these investments that are costly, these investments are very costly, the investments in electricity generation.

This is, I would say, the most sustainable path, because, besides, it is totally coherent with everything we propose in environmental policy, with all the commitment we have in our programs and in our commitments with the COP conferences, to reduce the emission of CO2 into space, in other words, it is coherent and guarantees sustainable development.

We are also looking for foreign investments that will allow us to strengthen, update and improve the processing of some of our refineries, which would also allow us to process this national crude oil.

Ignacio Ramonet: To refine it.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: To refine it, and to achieve other products that would also be exportable or that would be useful for domestic consumption and we would have to import less of these products for domestic consumption.

There is also a whole energy saving program that goes from the culture of the population?

Ignacio Ramonet: To reduce consumption and not to waste.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: To reduce consumption, not to waste, and, on the other hand, there is a whole development of photovoltaic technologies, let us say more in the domestic field, of equipment that work with photovoltaic energy sources. There is also the replacement of luminaires with LED luminaires, which consume less energy and also last longer, and all this combined group of actions will lead us to a better electro-energy situation.

This is well defined and well programmed. Unfortunately, to get there we have to go through moments like these, but it is one of the ways in which we can overcome the effects of the blockage in relation to the energy issue.

Ignacio Ramonet: Mr. President, in any case, this situation you are describing and the previous one, with the difficulties, the hardships, has lately provoked a sociological phenomenon that was unknown in Cuba, which are the social protests. On the one hand, many people are emigrating because they cannot stand the current conditions and, on the other hand, the protests which, although they have not been massive, have been surprising because this is not usual.
So, I would like you to explain to us, first, how do you analyze the nature of these protests and what lessons are you drawing from this situation?

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Ramonet, first of all, I believe that our people have suffered the effects of the blockade, besides, as I was saying, it is an accumulated effect of the blockade in more than sixty years. My generation, which was born in the early years of the Revolution, is a generation that has lived blocked by the shortages caused by the blockade.

Ignacio Ramonet: The blockade has always been present.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: But my children were born under blockade and our grandchildren were born and are living under blockade conditions. Therefore, this has had a direct effect on the Cuban population.

Precisely, conceptually, what does the U.S. Government and the imperial policy defend in relation to destroying the Cuban Revolution?

There is a reference called the Mallory Memorandum, based precisely on a memorandum written by a State Department official in the sixties in an assessment of Cuba, who said that, given the level of popular support the Revolution had, the way to overthrow the Revolution was: economic asphyxiation, trying to do everything possible so that the people would suffer hardship, shortages and that this would lead to a break with the Revolution and, therefore, would provoke a social explosion that would lead to the fall of the Revolution.
That has been the policy, that has been the reference point, the fundamental concept, and that is what they are doing with the tightening of the blockade. In 60 years they have not been able to break us, and they have gone for a tightening of the blockade to break us. They are not going to break us either! I continue to believe in the capacity of response, in the heroism of this people and in the creative resistance I mentioned to you.

Now, in these times in particular, with this intensification of the blockade, on occasions we have had the coincidence of several factors on this population: prolonged blackouts, transportation problems, the shortages of life, problems in guaranteeing the basic food basket, problems with food, problems with medicines.

When there are blackouts, the water supply is affected, because the water supply sources also work with electricity; which, by the way, we have made a very important investment now in transforming pumping systems into photovoltaic systems as well, and this is part of the things we are doing to overcome this situation.

At certain times, there have also been demonstrations in some places and with a certain participation, I would say, in greater numbers, more massive in the events of July 11; less massive in that of March 17, although the media presented it as very massive as part of the other component of this aggressive policy towards Cuba of maximum pressure, which is on the one hand the economic asphyxiation with the tightening of the blockade, and on the other hand is the media intoxication where they try to discredit the Cuban Revolution, and where there is a virtual Cuba and a real Cuba. Then, in a number of places, there have been popular protests.

What have been the characteristics of these claims? Most of these claims have taken place in a situation of peaceful claims, where most of the people who have gone to claim what they have asked for is an explanation. Look, they are not demands for a rupture with the Revolution, people have gone to Government institutions or to Party institutions.

Ignacio Ramonet: That was seen very well in Santiago.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: In Santiago.
They have gone to ask for an explanation, to ask for ratification if the situation is due to certain circumstances, and who are the ones who have shown their faces? Who are the ones who have been talking to the people, because they are part of the people? They have been precisely the leaders of the Party, the leaders of the Government and the administrations in those places, and without police repression, without repression of any kind.

 

Photo: ­Pérez, Leandro
Also, in these protests there have been small groups that have not behaved in a peaceful manner and this is one of the things that the media intoxication promoted by the empire tries to distort. Many of these people have been financed by subversive projects of the U.S. Government and they receive money systematically to take advantage of situations like this and demonstrate against the Revolution. Nor do they have a repressive response for demonstrating against the Revolution.

Ignacio Ramonet: The Cuban Constitution guarantees the right to demonstrate.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: It does not have a repressive response, they can have a popular response because the population..., it has even happened, there are people in these protests who say: “Wait, we have to talk with the Government and talk with the Party”, and they have confronted and have not allowed them to shout counterrevolutionary slogans or other types of things; but, even that opinion that someone who is not with the Revolution may have is not repressed. What happens is that many times, because it is part of the same platform of subversion, those who protest in this way against the Revolution, who are the fewest, in these protests commit acts of vandalism and attempt against state properties, against social properties, alter public order, and this then leads to a response which is not due to ideology, it is a judicial response, a legal response as they would do in any other country, because they are altering public order, they are altering the tranquility of the citizens, they are committing misdeeds or committing acts of vandalism.

What happens is that this is not presented in this way by the international media, it is presented in a different way, because there is a script, an unconventional war script that proposes: first, social outbreak, claims or protests; second, the mounting of police repression; third, the mounting of political prisoners, that is, repression with political prisoners in quotation marks; then to demonstrate that because of these things there is a failed State, and then the alleged humanitarian aid and the change of regime. That is the script and the script of the Unconventional Warfare that today is applied against Cuba, that is applied against Nicaragua, that is applied against Venezuela.

So, there is a distortion there and, I would say, this type of protests that have existed in Cuba, as you say, which is a relatively new fact - the world has also changed and our society has changed, also the conditions caused by the tightening of the blockade make our lives change - are attended to, they are explained, they do not cause a rupture between the people and the Revolution, because, besides, we also have a working system where we are visiting the places, we are constantly talking to the population, we provide information on these problems.

Why is there no mention of the protests in the United States, which generally end with police brutality, especially against black people or humble people? Why is there no mention of police brutality during the protests that have taken place in the United States these days, in the universities, which were peaceful, totally peaceful, in favor of the Palestinian cause and against the genocide committed by Israel, supported by the United States, against the Palestinian people? And what has been the response of the United States government to these events? Police repression, mistreatment of students, mistreatment even of teachers, with boots on people's necks. We have seen scenes of a teacher, an elderly person, subdued, reduced, humiliated on the floor. That does not happen in Cuba, that does not happen in Cuba!

Why were there no criticisms of the protests in other European countries in which demonstrators were also shot or in which in less than two days there were more than 3,000 prisoners and which were indeed peaceful protests? Why are those in Cuba the ones that are amplified and why are they the ones that take on such dimensions?

For example, I tell you, on March 17, when we were in direct contact with the three places where social protests took place, around seven o'clock at night everything was already in complete order, and, besides, that day in the country there were different activities in which people were participating as part of a Sunday, and still at one o'clock in the morning the media platforms of intoxication were saying that there was a massive protest all over Cuba: a total lie, a slander, a construction.

I say, Ramonet, what can you expect from a government of the main power in the world in order to attack a country, whose only sin can be that it wants self-determination, independence, and sovereignty and that it wants to build a model different from the one that the United States government wants to impose as part of its hegemonic policy, that for that reason that power resorts to a brutal blockade for so many years and that in order to overthrow the Revolution it has to resort to lies? It is so perverse, such constructions are so vulgar.

I say, if we are so wrong, if we are so inefficient, if we are really such failures, don't apply any sanction to me, let me fall. But no, I know that the example of Cuba, and I say this without any expression of boasting, much less, without any Cuban chauvinism..., we know what we represent as an example for Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world, because one constantly sees how many people in the world have made solidarity with Cuba the center of their lives, and this is not by choice, this is because there is an example, because there is trust, because there is a guiding light, with which we assume a tremendous commitment, because we cannot let it down. That is the only thing that explains why such a powerful government has to resort to such practices to try to subdue a small country.

Ignacio Ramonet: We are going to pause here, President.

President, we are going to address the second block of our interview, which are questions on the economy, we are essentially going to ask four questions.

The first one is the following: I would like to know your assessment of the current state of the Cuban economy and what measures your Government is taking to face some of the current challenges, besides the blockade, obviously, such as, for example, inflation, which you already addressed in part; the partial dollarization that is taking place, and also the lack of significant foreign direct investments taking place.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Ramonet, I think that part of the question, as an answer, we advanced it when we were describing what the blockade meant because it is precisely that blockade that is giving rise to the new economic situation, which is the one described.

So, to summarize it, to focus more on what we are going to do to overcome this situation, we have to say that it is an economy that today operates under complex conditions and where there is a whole group of economic imbalances.

So, to face this, what are we proposing? First, we have designed a Macroeconomic Stabilization Program that will be developed over a long period of time, let us say, until 2030, and which will have to be constantly adjusted in order to achieve the macroeconomic balances that the country needs in the shortest possible time. It deals with the problems of inflation, the problems of the exchange market, and, of course, the exchange rate; it deals with monetary policy, fiscal policy, and incentives for domestic production and exports; it also includes elements of salaries, pensions, employment, and all the reorganization we must make of the economic system and the policies that have to do with the use of our finances, with the allocation of resources, with the role of the state enterprise, with the relationship between the state enterprise and the rest of the economic actors.

Now, it is based on several premises. One premise is that we are looking for ways in which we can stimulate national production, because by stimulating national production we gain economic sovereignty; by stimulating national production we can also satisfy the country's domestic needs, so that the domestic market becomes a source of development.

Ignacio Ramonet: Are you thinking above all about agriculture, for example, for food sovereignty?

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: We are precisely talking about it.

We can produce an important part of the food the country needs and import less food. Today we have to have more than 2 billion dollars to import food, and because you invest them you do not always import the same amount or even more; on the contrary, you import less because prices and freight costs go up.

Furthermore, from this increase in domestic production and the efficiency of this domestic production, we must also achieve competitiveness in exports in order to earn foreign currency and make this domestic production sustainable.

This concept of stimulating national production and, above all, agriculture, we are not taking it to the country scale, but we are taking it to the country scale to be built from the local scale: how each municipality has a municipal self-supply program, how each province has a provincial self-supply program, and that all these efforts and all this construction from the community, from the neighborhood, by the municipality, the province, reach the country and stabilize the food situation of the country.

That is why we have developed a Food Sovereignty Policy and there is a Food Sovereignty Law.

Ignacio Ramonet: Is it giving results, and do you see the results?

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: I have an experience. Since January we have been visiting every month all the provinces of the country and in each province we are visiting a different municipality every month.

What have we observed? We have observed good experiences where workers and workers' collectives, with the leadership they have, do things differently, and in conditions of an intensified blockade, just like all the others, they find answers to what we have to achieve, including many of them in the area of food production. I have seen very interesting things in that sense.

Ignacio Ramonet: That could be extended to other parts of the country.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Anjá, but let's say that today they are exceptions.

So, we also have other places we have visited where the performance is not adequate, and where the collectives are perhaps more overwhelmed by the weight of the restrictions of the blockade and not by the thinking we want to develop, which is the thinking of creative resistance: “I am affected by the blockade in this and this, but in conditions of blockade I can do this, this, this and overcome and move forward”.

What we intend is that these are inspiring, that inspired by the example of those who do things differently, they acquire that experience and go to a better performance, and then what today is an exception becomes the rule.
But there is already something interesting, because, I tell you, these convictions and these criteria that I am sharing with you are not a call nor is it our propaganda, it is that one has it as a conviction precisely because of what one is appreciating in these visits to each place in the country.

So, for example, in the tours of March and April we began to observe that places that closed 2023, last year, with unproductive, unprofitable, inefficient performances, are starting to leave this situation behind and begin to approach this. Now, what do we have to achieve? That this transformation is sustainable over time. I think that's where the answers are, we have the answers ourselves.

What are we telling them later when we share with the management of the territories? We have to take this one that does not do it well to the concepts of this one that does it well, the experience is right there.

It is very stimulating to see how in each place of the country there are things that still do not have the productive levels of activities, of contributions that we need, but there are also lights in those examples.

Ignacio Ramonet: On the part of the State, the necessary reforms of laws have been made to facilitate a new production.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: We still have to guarantee that the state enterprise can operate under the same conditions as the non-state sector, but today the state enterprise has a group of powers that have been given to it, which are not always well used. To the extent that it is used with a more advanced and flexible business culture, it will undoubtedly have an impact.

So, a fundamental concept is science and innovation. A poor country like ours, with scarce natural resources but with a lot of talent, has a construction founded by the Commander-in-Chief, which was continued by the General of the Army and which continues to be expanded and updated in the midst of these conditions: that the answers to our problems must be found in scientific research, taking all this to innovation. That is why we have opted for a Government Management System based on Science and Innovation to be applied in all areas. That is how we faced COVID-19 and now we are taking it to the field of agriculture, to the field of industry, to the issue of food production.
There is also the attention to individuals and families in vulnerable conditions. Each of the measures that we are going to apply must have a treatment so that vulnerable people and families in vulnerable situations are not affected, because our purpose is not to create more inequalities; on the contrary, it is to reduce the inequality gap, and that we are capable of producing with the awareness that the wealth that we are capable of generating is what we can distribute and that we are going to distribute it with social justice.

Ignacio Ramonet: Mr. President, among the changes that have taken place in Cuba's economy in recent years is the emergence of a market economy, right? In particular, this has expanded lately with the development of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, which here are called MSMEs. What is your assessment of this phenomenon that is transforming Cuba's economic fabric?

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: In this sense, I think there are some clarifications to be made.

First, we have a planned economy that takes into account market signals, but it is not an economy based on pure market economy, there is a concept of social justice where market laws are not the ones that drive economic development, because above all, we think a lot in terms of people. Sometimes the efficiency of the Cuban economy is criticized from a purely economic point of view, but I say: that this blocked economy, which still does not satisfy all our needs, maintains important social conquests that today in Cuba are assumed to a right; but in many places they are still not a conquest. So, I believe that there is also a certain level of injustice in assessing exactly the behavior of the Cuban economy. On the one hand, it is a planned economy but it takes into account, it recognizes the signals of the market and the laws of the market.

On the other hand, the MSME sector. First, there are state MSMEs and there are non-state, private MSMEs, that is to say, it is not only a private sector field. And the private sector existed in Cuba, but here it has expanded, because an important part of agricultural production is in the hands of private farmers and agricultural cooperatives.

There was self-employment, what happened is that since we did not have the development of MSMEs, self-employment was confused with self-employment and it already generated certain articulations or certain relationships that were more than self-employment and became organizations.

Ignacio Ramonet: Yes, they were already small companies with employees.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Those companies that, although they were not recognized, worked like that. In other words, what I believe is that we updated the situation we had, and that something very coherent has been proposed, which is to take advantage of all the potentialities the country has. So, it is a state-owned company that must play a fundamental role in the socialist construction, but which has a private sector as a complement to the economic activity.

Ignacio Ramonet: What does this private market sector currently represent?

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: Today when people talk about the dynamics of MSMEs, they say: “No, but they are growing a lot”. They are growing, it is a relatively new process, and let us say that we already have around 10,000; but one of our concepts, as part of the socialist construction, is that the main means of production are in the hands of the State and are represented by State enterprises. Therefore, the greatest weight of the economy is in the state sector, without denying the important contribution of the non-state sector.

I believe that this has also been a relatively new area in the improvement of our economic-social system. Now, we have to correct some distortions in the relations between state enterprises and state entities with non-state entities, so that all of them, as part of a group of economic actors in our society, contribute and are inserted in the National Economic and Social Development Plan. And that is why, in exchange with the non-state sector, in exchange with the Cuban business sector, we are now updating a whole group of rules so that this may work more coherently and really boost the country's economy from the contribution of the state and the contribution of the non-state sector.

Here we are also insisting that many of these companies are formed on the basis of the concept of high-technology companies and innovative companies, and we can have them in the state sector, because one of the characteristics of MSMEs, whether state or private, is that they are companies which, due to their conception and the way they operate, adapt more quickly to changes and have greater capacity for innovation.

Ignacio Ramonet: They are also smaller.

Miguel M. Díaz-Canel: They are smaller, they operate in a more flexible way and, therefore, the contributions and dynamics they can bring to the economy are very important.