LATENT AGRICULTURAL WEALTH
Cuba is, first and last, an agricultural country. The climate, soil, and
proximity to favorable markets, create unusually favorable conditions.
The recent extensions of the railroad system, and the additions to the
_calsadas_, or government highways, of which one thousand miles were
built in the last year, have greatly improved the facilities for
interior transportation. The Government has established experiment
stations, and in other ways encouraged farming and stock raising;
railroad and development companies have extended generous aid in the
same direction. Millions have been sunk, during late years, in organized
efforts to promote agricultural industries in different parts of the
Island, aside from the investments in sugar and tobacco. But,
notwithstanding, agriculture has not advanced in Cuba at anything like
the rate that should have been experienced.
Before the last war there were upwards of one hundred thousand
plantations, ranches, and farms in the country, of which the value was
not less than $200,000,000. Very few of these properties were made to
yield adequately. Among the sugar and tobacco estates, good management
was the exception, rather than the rule. Despite the natural advantages
that he enjoyed, or perhaps because of them, the Cuban farmer hardly
ever made the most of his opportunities, nor displayed a respectable
degree of enterprise. It is true that he labored under heavy handicaps
in the political and economic conditions, but since these drawbacks have
been removed he has not shown any marked improvement. Nor has any great
advance in agricultural development followed the introduction of
American capital and American settlers, save in the sugar and tobacco
industries. The former has often been misapplied, and the latter do not
appear to have gained a grasp of the situation.
That something is radically wrong in the state of Cuban agriculture is
made glaringly apparent by the fact that the country imports annually
$25,000,000 worth of foodstuffs that it might produce. Not only that,
but several of the items that make up this aggregate represent products
that might be raised in Cuba to an extent sufficient to supply the
domestic demand and leave a considerable surplus for exportation. It is
not to be supposed, however, that under present conditions any such
results are possible. The Cubans might do much more than they are doing
to make their country productive, but until the population is greatly
increased no approximation to the utmost agricultural possibilities can
be attained. Estimates differ widely as to the extent of the area under
cultivation, but it is certainly a very small proportion of that adapted
to agriculture.
Although the soil is distinctly suitable to such treatment, intensive
cultivation and scientific methods are practised only in a few places,
and by foreigners, the usual proceeding is to plant over an extended
tract, burning the fields in the dry season and leaving the ashes on the
ground. When the rains have sufficiently moistened the earth, holes are
made in it with a pointed stick, called a _jan_, and into the holes are
dropped the seed or root from which the crop is to be derived. This
method continuously robs the soil of the elements in which its
fertility consists and at length it becomes “tired,” as the natives say.
It is then necessary to fertilize the ground, or to abandon its
cultivation. The farmer usually adopts the latter alternative and,
moving into the forest, clears another tract and starts a fresh _finca_,
to be treated by the same process. This is what the scientific
agriculturalist Liebeg termed “a system of cultivation by expoliation.”
The great difficulty in Cuba is that, in proportion to the land
available, there is little labor, and less capital. The most complete
and effective remedy will, of course, be found in an increase of the
population, but in the meanwhile conditions would be greatly improved if
the Cubans could be taught to handle their lands more intelligently and
with greater energy. There is no man on earth more susceptible to an
object lesson than the Cuban. Abstruse theories are slow to penetrate
his mind, but he readily grasps the significance of a visible
exposition. For this reason it is believed that the experiment stations,
of which there are now half a dozen or more in the Island, will not be
without effect in promoting better farming.
Nearly all the crops of northern latitudes may be raised satisfactorily
upon the uplands of Cuba. It is questionable, however, whether wheat,
barley, and oats, would be as profitable crops as some others to which
the ground might be devoted. Corn of an indifferent quality is widely
grown and fed to stock. There seems to be no reason why the very best
varieties of this grain should not be produced on Cuban soil, and
efforts are being made to induce farmers to use selected seed and better
methods in the cultivation. Two crops a year are secured and,
unfortunately, the ground is often sown continuously in corn for long
periods. Rotation is something that the Cuban farmer has yet to
appreciate. On the lands about the coast, a great deal of rice is
raised, but the domestic consumption of this cereal is very large and
there is no surplus for export. This is, however, one of the crops which
might be increased without any extraordinary effort, and the United
States market would be open to the importation of all the excess
product.
Another instance of neglected opportunity is found in the potato. The
Cuban tuber, which has only recently been introduced to the United
States, is of excellent quality and might be made a serious rival of
the famous Bermuda potato. Two crops a year, with an enormous yield to
the acre, are harvested, but the output is far from reaching the
quantity that could be profitably marketed. At the present time the
United States is sending yearly to Cuba potatoes to more than twice the
value of all the vegetables received from the Island, and the quality of
the imported article is far from as good as that of the domestic
product. Cuba also buys beans annually to the value of more than two
hundred thousand dollars, despite the fact that every variety of this
vegetable grows abundantly in almost any part of the Island, and with
little cultivation. The natives consume large quantities of beans, and
should not only grow all that they eat, but also ship considerable
amounts to the ready markets which are open for them. An excellent
quality of sweet potato will grow almost anywhere in the Island, with a
large yield to the acre. The yam, a large variety of sweet potato,
abounds everywhere, and with a little cultivation the quality could be
improved to the point of creating an export demand.
There is very little cultivation of beets, but where they are raised the
quality is so unusually good and the yield so great, that it is
believed beet culture might with ordinary effort be made one of the
leading agricultural industries of the Island. In fact, the question of
beet-sugar production has been raised more than once, but naturally
enough it has not met with encouragement in a country where the beet is
anathema.
It has been demonstrated that two crops a year of the highest grade of
peanuts can be raised in Cuba. It is claimed that the largest recorded
production to the acre of the nut has been secured by a Cuban planter.
There are great possibilities in this industry, but it does not appear
to be systematically carried on anywhere in the Island, and the peanut
has no place in the statistics of exports. Mention has been made
elsewhere of Cuba’s great need of comparatively small manufacturing
enterprises and the benefits that might be expected to accrue from them.
The peanut affords an opportunity in this direction. It is practically
certain that several factories for the extraction of the oil and the
manufacture of the butter could be run in the Island with profit,
especially if the factories maintained their own plantations for the
supply of the raw material.
None of the vegetables are cultivated to the extent which they might be
with profit. Cuba should export fresh vegetables in large quantities to
the New York market, where the winter and spring demands are insatiable.
Cucumbers, radishes, onions, lettuce, and other table delicacies grow
all the year round in the Island. And instead of producing and shipping
them, as she should, Cuba is even importing cabbage. The Chinese
truck-gardeners are the only people in the Island who appear to have any
understanding of intensive and careful cultivation, if we except a few
foreigners who have not yet had sufficient experience to produce the
results which they are aiming at, and which they will doubtless achieve
in time.
All classes of Cubans eat quantities of plantain. The vegetable is
rarely absent from the table, where it appears in all manner of
forms,--dried and fried, baked and boiled. The banana is also consumed
in large quantities and in various forms. There are a great number of
varieties of the fruit, the best known being the “Manzano” and the
“Johnson.” The latter is the variety that is cultivated most extensively
for export. The banana industry is an important factor in Cuba’s
commerce, but its development is due entirely to the fact of the
cultivation having been taken in hand by foreign capital and conducted
under foreign direction. The demand for bananas might have continued
until Doomsday without the Cubans having taken advantage of the obvious
opportunity afforded by it. The United States takes one million dollars’
worth or more of bananas from Cuba every year.
Commercial fruit culture in Cuba was only commenced in late years and,
if the banana business be left out of consideration, is still in a
backward state of development. The several colony enterprises of
American and Canadian land companies have had for their principal
objects the sale and cultivation of fruit lands. On the whole these
projects have been unsuccessful viewed from the standpoint of the
settler. This has been due to a variety of causes which will be
considered in the following chapter. Although various marketable fruits
have grown wild in Cuba for centuries the natives made little or no
effort to turn them to commercial account.
In the past few years pineapples have been systematically raised with
profit. The Cuban product is particularly hardy and of an excellent
[Illustration: GATHERING COCOANUTS.]
quality. The _piña blanca_ is the sweetest variety, but it does not keep
well and is therefore not adapted to exportation. The _piña morada_ is
smaller, more scaly, and less juicy than the former. It has, however,
greater resisting qualities and represents almost the entire export of
this fruit, whilst the _piña blanca_ meets the domestic demand. The
United States market takes several hundred thousand dollars’ worth of
pineapples annually from Cuba.
When the industry was first started, the fruit fetched one dollar per
dozen in Habana, for export. The price has now fallen to about
one-fourth of that figure on account of the increase in production of
several countries, but even at present rates the pineapple can be raised
in Cuba at a very fair profit. Little labor is involved in the
cultivation, preparation for shipment is simple, and the yield is very
great. One _caballeria_ of land devoted to pineapples will cost about
$4,000 to keep up during the five years that the plant bears. In that
period it will give five crops of 18,000 dozen pineapples each. The last
crop, however, will be too small for use except in the manufacture of
preserves, and the full market price can only be counted on for the
yield of the first three years. But, even at that, if 54,000 dozens of
the fruit are marketed at twenty-five cents per dozen, there is a
balance of $9,800, after paying expenses, in addition to the profit to
be secured from the last two crops.
From this it would seem that pineapple culture is well worth while to
the man of comparatively small capital, especially as the necessary
ground can be bought in hundreds of places at less than ten dollars an
acre.
It must be admitted, however, that practical growers scout these
statements of profits, which are derived from official sources. The
owners of pineapple plantations, Americans and Spaniards for the most
part, declare that they are actually shipping at a loss. But for some
inscrutable reason they continue to raise the fruit with a constantly
increasing output.
One of the chief difficulties experienced by the investigator in Cuba
lies in the proneness of all classes of planters to deny that there is
any money in their business. They declare that the transportation
companies and commission merchants are absorbing all the profits. On the
other hand, a railroad manager will take paper and pencil and
demonstrate convincingly that
[Illustration: PINEAPPLE FIELD.]
the pineapple grower or the citrus fruit shipper is earning a very fair
income.
It is probable that the Cuban growers may find the canning business
profitable, as those of Hawaii have done. If the Government would lend
its encouragement to such an enterprise by reducing or removing the high
duty on sheet tin and cans, there is no doubt but that a cannery could
be successfully conducted in western Cuba, where the greater part of the
pineapple cultivation is carried on.
Although, for lack of proper cultivation, Cuba has long produced an
orange of second rate quality, it has been demonstrated by actual
accomplishment in several instances that the fruit can be grown in the
Island to equal any in the world. But this result can only be attained
by the expenditure of considerable money, the application of
considerable knowledge, and the exercise of considerable patience.
Without either of these necessary factors, hundreds of Americans have
entered upon orange growing, and thousands have invested in orange lands
during the past ten years or so. The citrus fruit boom was launched on a
very unstable basis and its decline was as rapid as its growth.
There is as little ground for the statement frequently made nowadays
that there is nothing in orange culture in Cuba, as there was for the
former claim that a fortune was easily to be made out of it in ten
years. The simple fact is that the man who has the means to buy suitable
ground, to plant and tend and fertilize it properly, and maintain
himself until the grove yields, may depend upon a satisfactory return
from his investment. At present the margin is small, owing mainly to the
expenses incurred in marketing the product, but there is every reason to
believe that this burden will be considerably lightened in the next few
years.
Many growers have abandoned their orange groves in Cuba. Others have
turned to grape-fruit, which appears to promise a greater prospect of
profit, although there is some danger of over-production injuring the
business. In Cuba the grape fruit grows to perfection. The cost of its
production and shipment is no greater than that of the orange, and it
stands carriage a great deal better. The prices at present obtained for
it leave a considerably higher margin than can be secured from oranges.
Though by no means great as yet, the market
[Illustration: BREADFRUIT.]
for what may be called fancy fruits, such as the mango, guava, and
alligator pear,--which perhaps would more properly be classed as a
vegetable,--is constantly expanding in the United States. Cuba produces
a number of delicious fruits which are quite unknown to Americans at
home, but which they soon learn to enjoy when resident in the Island. It
is altogether probable that a persistent effort to introduce some of
these to the United States market would result in a permanent demand at
profitable prices. There is a large class of New York consumers of
delicacies who are ever ready to pay for the pleasure of having their
palates tickled.
In the middle of the nineteenth century there were upwards of two
thousand coffee plantations in Cuba, and the annual output amounted to
more than two million _arrobas_ of the berry. During the latter half of
the century the industry rapidly declined under the severe competition
of South America, until it became almost extinct before the war. There
is little doubt, however, but that the product of the Island might have
withstood the competition in question had a more rational system of
cultivation and preparation been in vogue.
In the past few years there have been signs of a revival of the coffee
industry, especially in Oriente, where the tree can be cultivated to the
best advantage. All classes of Cubans drink the beverage freely and
about two million dollars’ worth of the berries are imported yearly. It
will probably not be long before native plantations are taking care of
the entire domestic demand, after which they may be able to make an
entrance to some of the foreign markets.
Efforts are being made in several directions to revive the old-time
cotton industry in Cuba, whence upwards of one million _arrobas_ of the
fibre were shipped in the year 1842. The Upland and Sea Island varieties
grow well in many parts of the Island and recently several small
plantations have been set out under the direction of Americans of
experience.
Ramie and henequen grow well in Cuba and seem to deserve greater
attention than is at present being paid to their cultivation. As these
plants thrive in what is generally classed as barren land, there is a
distinct economy involved in their culture.
[Illustration: HEMP FIELD ABOVE MATANZAS.]