This Sunday, the Ministry of Construction in Cuba added the province of Granma to its list of failures in the 2023 housing plan. According to the official press, of the 1,636 houses planned in the territory, only 737 were built, 45%. . The Granma authorities insisted on blaming the “little manufacturing development” and the citizens’ resistance to “alternative materials”, but the real problem, they admit, is the “decrease in the delivery of steel and cement to the territories”, products that They cannot be obtained locally.
Of the state housing plan, which is handled by the Ministry, only 184 (28%) of the 669 projected homes were built, revealed to the official Granma the provincial authorities. For their part, state companies, which invest part of their profits in building houses for workers, managed to build 553 (57%) of the 965 proposals.
Finally, the subsidies – an allocation of money and materials at a lower price made by the State for families with a poor housing situation –, which present the greatest delay in Granma and for which the construction of 409 units was foreseen, were only fulfilled in 15%, with 84 houses.
Local development projects, Tejeda warned, have not focused on the use of “alternative” materials either.
Michel Tejeda Acuña, coordinator of the provincial government, explained that in addition to the lack of cement and steel, the “limited” development of companies in the province also makes it difficult to carry out the plan, which prevents local resources such as stones, wood from being exploited. and clay for construction.
Local development projects, Tejeda warned, have also not focused on the use of “alternative” materials nor are they “in accordance” with the capabilities of the territory. Only one of these projects, managed by individuals with the help of the State, seems to half meet expectations: Porkace, in Bayamo, which builds bricks with clay.
The artisanal production of bricks and tiles by citizens who set up small businesses, often illegal, has for years supplied those looking for cheap materials that they cannot find through state channels. The chronic lack of construction materials has led many to replace blocks with bricks, something that the State has also had to resort to in the face of its own deficiency.
The potters have also become suppliers to the Ministry of Construction, and artisanal brick production is the only thing that is going well. Their contribution, however, is not enough either. “In Granma, about five million bricks are produced, and it is estimated to grow to about seven million, but to satisfy the demand of the housing policy, more than 12 million are needed annually,” explained Tejeda.
The only good news in the province came from the municipality of Pilón, which, with a policy of “going more endogenously, and not wasting anything”, was the only one to comply with its housing plan, although replacing cement with wood. The buildings, of which the type of wood is not specified, will be delivered to victims of cyclones. But, beyond worrying about the quality of housing, authorities emphasized cost reduction and celebrated the use of local resources.
In Pinar del Río, the official newspaper highlighted, this strategy has allowed some municipalities to reach the goal of building one home per day. However, this does not include the electrical installation or other resources necessary to finish the homes and which depend on national distribution. The same happens with the block industry, which in Vuelta Abajo has the capacity to exceed “four or five times” the national one, but they depend on the arrival of cement and aggregates. “In other words, for a long time the program has been supported by resources that are not obtained in the province, and that, therefore, do not ensure its sustainability,” lamented Jesús Nilo Soca, coordinator of the territorial government.
The clay brick, once again, must replace the blocks. Until last November, Pinar del Río produced 800,000 bricks. “In 11 months we have exceeded five years’ production,” said Yalexis León, director of the Provincial Civil Maintenance and Construction Company. In 2024, production is expected to be between 2 and 2.5 million annually, he added.
Clay has been a resource that, because it is easily found, is used as an alternative for the production of many materials.
Clay has been a resource that, because it is easily found, is used as an alternative for the production of many materials. This is how, at least, it was promoted by Delilah Díaz Hernández, General Director of Materials of the Ministry of Construction, in a Round Table last June. At the same time, she announced that the Cuban marble, of greater value, would be exported to “finance” the construction of homes.
The local production of materials has been a policy implemented by the Government for years. This is how the newspaper remembered it Granma, which highlighted that since 2010, when there were 55 workshops of this type, the number has increased to reach 465 nationwide. This “means that more than 80% of the resources required for a home can be obtained locally,” but reality shows the opposite.
The excessive increase in the prices of construction materials in recent years has made the hope of having a house in Cuba unrealistic. Even with subsidies, citizens often complain, it is not possible to build a wall, since the value of rods, blocks or gravel increases without the state allocation. To make matters worse, these resources are no longer even found in the material yards (points of sale).
The same happens with companies and the Ministry of Construction itself, whose budget is enough for less and less. An article published in 2022 by the newspaper Invader valued the possibility of the portfolio purchasing houses available in the real estate market, something that with the current drop in prices – due to the large number of Cubans leaving the country – would mean savings of millions in materials, personnel and time for the State. . However, the proposal fell on deaf ears.
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