No longer did Cuba have a source of cheap energy and agricultural inputs or a trade customer willing to buy sugar at a price greater than the open market. Beginning in 1989, Cuba s economy entered a crisis from which it is only now beginning to recover. Large state farms were broken up into cooperatives in order to give people financial incentives to be productive. Land in and around cities is being put into production, and Cubans now have access to food both at free market prices and in price-controlled government stores. Schools, businesses, the Cuban army, and many private citizens now maintain their own gardens and are self-supporting in vegetables.
Farmers can presently earn incomes many times that of a teacher or doctor.
In this way, Cuba s government hopes to encourage more people to go into farming. Cuba s scientists have played an important role making the new agriculture sustainable. For example, producers can now purchase microbial seed treatments that are said to provide crops with much of their requirements for phosphorus and nitrogen. Other microbial treatments combat damping off of seedlings. These inoculants and a number of beneficial insects are produced in local facilities using fairly low-tech methods.