Cuba bids for foreign investment to tackle goods shortages

Cuba says it will allow foreign investors into its wholesale and retail trade for the first time in 60 years.

The move is a major shift for the island nation’s Communist government, and overturns a 1960s Fidel Castro policy of nationalizing retail.

But Cuba is now facing its most severe economic crisis in decades, with rising prices and public discontent.

The policy aims to tackle shortages of basic goods, like food and medicine – but stops short of fully opening trade.

Government officials said that foreign investors would be able to wholly or partially own Cuba-based wholesalers.

But retail will not be open to international investors without scrutiny, as “a state market has to prevail” foreign trade minister Betsy Díaz Velázquez said.

In 1969, Fidel Castro nationalized Cuba’s private wholesale and retail industry. The new foreign investment bill, however, recognizes that the country’s centralized government cannot resolve its essential goods shortage without investment from overseas.