The government continues to balance the need for loosening its socialist economic system against a desire for firm political control. In April 2011, the government held the first Cuban Communist Party Congress in almost 13 years, during which leaders approved a plan for wide-ranging economic changes. Since then, the government has slowly and incrementally implemented limited economic reforms, including allowing Cubans to buy electronic appliances and cell phones, stay in hotels, and buy and sell used cars. The government has cut state sector jobs as part of the reform process, and it has opened up some retail services to "self-employment," leading to the rise of so-called "cuentapropistas" or entrepreneurs. More than 500,000 Cuban workers are currently registered as self-employed.
The Cuban regime has updated its economic model to include permitting the private ownership and sale of real estate and new vehicles, allowing private farmers to sell agricultural goods directly to hotels, allowing the creation of non-agricultural cooperatives, adopting a new foreign investment law, and launching a "Special Development Zone" around the Mariel port.
Since 2016, Cuba has attributed slowed economic growth in part to problems with petroleum product deliveries from Venezuela. Since late 2000, Venezuela provided petroleum products to Cuba on preferential terms, supplying at times nearly 100,000 barrels per day. Cuba paid for the oil, in part, with the services of Cuban personnel in Venezuela, including some 30,000 medical professionals.
1.6% (2017 est.)
0.5% (2016 est.)
4.4% (2015 est.)
5.5% (2017 est.)
4.5% (2016 est.)
Moody's rating: Caa2 (2014)
$137 billion (2017 est.)
$134.8 billion (2016 est.)
$134.2 billion (2015 est.)
note: data are in 2016 US dollars
$93.79 billion (2017 est.)
note: data are in Cuban Pesos at 1 CUP = 1 US$; official exchange rate
$12,300 (2016 est.)
$12,200 (2015 est.)
$12,100 (2014 est.)
note: data are in 2016 US dollars
11.4% of GDP (2017 est.)
12.3% of GDP (2016 est.)
12.1% of GDP (2015 est.)
agriculture: 4% (2017 est.)
industry: 22.7% (2017 est.)
services: 73.4% (2017 est.)
household consumption: 57% (2017 est.)
government consumption: 31.6% (2017 est.)
investment in fixed capital: 9.6% (2017 est.)
investment in inventories: 0% (2017 est.)
exports of goods and services: 14.6% (2017 est.)
imports of goods and services: -12.7% (2017 est.)
sugar cane, cassava, vegetables, plantains, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, milk, pumpkins, mangoes/guavas, rice
petroleum, nickel, cobalt, pharmaceuticals, tobacco, construction, steel, cement, agricultural machinery, sugar
-1.2% (2017 est.)
4.691 million (2017 est.)
note: state sector 72.3%, non-state sector 27.7%
agriculture: 18%
industry: 10%
services: 72% (2016 est.)
2.6% (2017 est.)
2.4% (2016 est.)
note: data are official rates; unofficial estimates are about double
N/A
lowest 10%: NA
highest 10%: NA
revenues: 54.52 billion (2017 est.)
expenditures: 64.64 billion (2017 est.)
58.1% (of GDP) (2017 est.)
-10.8% (of GDP) (2017 est.)
47.7% of GDP (2017 est.)
42.7% of GDP (2016 est.)
calendar year
$985.4 million (2017 est.)
$2.008 billion (2016 est.)
$2.63 billion (2017 est.)
$2.546 billion (2016 est.)
China 38%, Spain 11%, Netherlands 5%, Germany 5% (2019)
cigars, raw sugar, nickel products, rum, zinc (2019)
$11.06 billion (2017 est.)
$10.28 billion (2016 est.)
Spain 19%, China 15%, Italy 6%, Canada 5%, Russia 5%, United States 5%, Brazil 5% (2019)
poultry meat, wheat, soybean products, corn, concentrated milk (2019)
$11.35 billion (31 December 2017 est.)
$12.3 billion (31 December 2016 est.)
$30.06 billion (31 December 2017 est.)
$29.89 billion (31 December 2016 est.)
Cuban pesos (CUP) per US dollar -
1 (2017 est.)
1 (2016 est.)
1 (2015 est.)
1 (2014 est.)
22.7 (2013 est.)
NOTE: The information regarding Cuba on this page is re-published from the 2021 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and other sources. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Cuba 2021 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Cuba 2021 should be addressed to the CIA or the source cited on each page.
This page was last modified 16 Dec 23, Copyright © 2023 ITA all rights reserved.