CLC-Conference-Proceeding-2018

Resolution No. 427/2012 from the Ministry of
Finance and Prices and Resolution No. 570/2012
from the Ministry of the Economy and Planning.
Certain characteristics that differentiate
the different types of existing cooperatives to the
present in the country can be observed:
The Credit and Services Cooperatives
(CCS): include the union of farmers who
maintain ownership over their land and other
work resources.
The Agricultural Production
Cooperatives (CPA): include a union of land
contributors, farmers, other willing individuals,
as well as their machinery, animals, and
facilities. These people who hand over their
property and other resources become owners of a
collective property.
Basic Cooperative Production Units (UBPC): are
made up of state workers who unite and become
agricultural cooperativists, who receive land and
other resources in gratuitous usufruct for an
indefinite period of time.
The Non-Farming Cooperatives (CNoA)
are characterized by collective ownership.
Members of CNoAs maintain ownership of the
property they contribute, others work with the
resources and property leased by the State
without a right of conveyance, and others
manage both properties, in accordance with the
decisions made by their partners.
One may disagree that the latest type of
economic management, the CNoAs, is more
encompassing and comprehensive, leaving more
leeway to its members to make decisions, and
considering it a more democratic model of
cooperatives, that their growth within the Cuban
society has been slow and, in many cases, has
not taken into consideration the principles and
values of cooperatives for their creation and
operation.
According to the ONEI’s legal and
administrative records, at the end of June 2015,
the country had 5490 Cooperatives, of which 351
were CNoAs, 1727 UBPCs, 898 CPAs and 2514
CCSs representing 94% of the so-called classic
or agricultural cooperatives which are divided
into 76% in the Ministry of Agriculture, 18% in
the Sugar Group, and 6% the remaining Bodies
and Agencies.
In the last five years there has been an
increase in the new types of economic
management, the CNoAs, and a decline in the
UPBCs and CPAs. If we compared the figures in
2011, there were 2165 UBPCs and in the first six
months of 2015 there were 1727, with the
difference of 438 UBPCs; something similar
occurred with the CPAs, with 104 CPAs fewer.
The same thing doesn’t happen with the
CCSs, which declined and grew again in 2015.
In 2017, the Cuban Government decided not to
approve any more CNoAs and began the process
of rectifying and reviewing the operations of
those that were already created and waited until
the perfect moment to leave open the possibility
again of new CNoAs emerging in different
sectors of the Cuban economy.
The foregoing behavior shows the mark
the self-administered cooperative sector has had
and will continue to have in Cuba. We must
remember that these types of ownership have
their roots in private property, because they are
all owners of the end result obtained through
their work, one member, one vote, and equality
of rights and obligations, and owners of their
own work.
Furthermore, the author believes that the
following aspects in the establishment and
operation process of the new cooperatives must
be taken into account.