Avestruz Ostriches and Jutía Rodent Food for Cuba, lol.

Ambassador to Brazil Tomas Rodrigues 2 of Brazilian birth and descent.
Miami Shores Vice Minister of Transportation and Communications of Brazilian Birth and descent, Tomas Rodrigues 1

On behalf of the 16,257 legal Brazilian immigrants and their descendants, as well as all future Brazilian immigrants and their descendants recently granted Honorary Hispanic citizenship and the xxxxxxx legal Brazilian Foreign Nationals.

On behalf of the people and government of Miami Shores, Minister of Foreign Diplomatic Relations, Otto Reich, and Vice Minister of Foreign Diplomatic Relations, Giovanni Corrado.

On behalf of President Lincoln Diaz-Balart, vice President Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Miami Shores Council of Ministers and my diplomatic staff in Reino do Brazil, we send our best wishes and personal respect to His Royal Majesty Alberto 1 of Reino do Brazil, and Her Royal Majesty Gisela Bénédicte Marguerite Amélie Elizabeth Viktoria de Hoentjie y Aichellie, Her Serene Highness, Princess of Garianlles, on their Royal Marriage which will bring both nations stronger and closer together.

Make and Keep Reino do Brazil Great Again.
Make and Keep Garianlles Greate Again.

:
Minister of Foreign Diplomatic Relations Otto Reich, German Austrian Jewish father, Cuban Catholic mother of Spaniard descent, born in La Habana Cuba City Province, Conservative Republican Nationalist Party CRNP.

Giovanni Corrado, Vice Minister of Foreign Diplomatic Relations, of Italian Colombian birth and descent, young 20 years old, the next future Minister of Foreign Diplomatic Relations and potential future President, provided Vice President Ileana Ros-Lehtinen wins the next Presidential election, once President Lincoln Diaz-Balart's second 5 years term expires, as predicted by Miami Shores leading psychic Aura Sanchinelli of Guatemalan, Italian birth and descent, whom everyone knows is always right.

To His Royal Majesty Alberto I: She is Hot, Lucky Dude.

Standing behind the President and Vice President - Pablo Padula, Uruguayan Vice Minister of Defense.
President Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Vice President Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
:
President Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Vice President Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, of Cuban birth and descent.

Minister of Defence, the old man I love and respect - Armando Perez Roura, of Cuban birth and descent.

Make and Keep Miami Shores Great Again.
President Lincoln Diaz-Balart.
Vice President Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
Miami Shores Council of Ministers.
Conservative Republican Nationalist Party.
The Democratic Capitalist Republic of Greater Miami Shores.

The people and government of Miami Shores send their well wishes and personal respect to His Royal Majesty Prince Alberto of Reino do Brazil and Her Royal Majesty Gisela Bénédicte Marguerite Amélie Elizabeth Viktoria de Hoentjie y Aichellie, Her Serene Highness, Princess of Garianlles, on their Royal marriage, which will bring your two nations closer together.

She is hot, lucky dude, lol.

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HAVANA (Reuters) - From breeding miniature cows to importing water buffalo, Cuban leaders have long gotten creative in their effort to remedy food shortages. Now, they are proposing ostrich and rodent farms as an answer, prompting ridicule from a weary population.

PIc:

Meat and eggs have become hard to find in the Communist-run country in recent months due to a declining economy. Meanwhile officials are touting the potential of the flightless African bird and the hutia, a rodent native to Cuba that can weigh up to 8.5 kg (19 pounds).

“An ostrich lays 60 eggs, and of those you get around 40 chicks, and from these 40 chicks per year you get four tonnes of meat - whereas a cow just gives birth to one calf and after a year it’s only a yearling,” said Guillermo Garcia Frias.
Garcia Frias, 91, holds the honorary title of commander of the revolution as a former guerrilla in Cuba’s 1959 revolution and heads state company Flora and Fauna that is developing seven ostrich farms. He spoke at a roundtable discussion broadcast on state TV last week.

He lavished praise on hutias for their “level of protein higher than any other meat” and “high quality pelt,” noting his company was also breeding crocodiles.
His comments have prompted sarcastic memes and jokes that have gone viral on social media since Cuba’s food schemes have often failed to fulfill expectations.

In one meme, a Cuban arrives home with a live ostrich he got via the state ration card. In another a flock of the birds from Cuba arrives at the Mexican-U.S. border seeking asylum.

Cubans also joked the state might give them an ostrich per household, as it did with chickens during the deep economic depression of the 1990s following the fall of former benefactor the Soviet Union.
“They should be focusing on chicken, a basic foodstuff that has disappeared, rather than something so unusual,” said Elizabeth Perez, 22, a law student who said she hadn’t been able to find chicken in the supermarket for a month.
Ostriches are already farmed around the world, particularly in South Africa. In the United States, the bird is often served more as a novelty than a staple. The red meat is said to resemble lean beef, with a gamey flavor.

For some, Garcia Frias’ comments recalled late leader Fidel Castro’s genetic engineering project to produce high-yield dairy cows.
His cow Ubre Blanca or White Udder is in the Guinness Book of Records for the highest milk yield by a cow in one day: 110 liters (29 gallons). Her offspring were not as productive so the experiment petered out.
Cuba imports 60 to 70 percent of its food because of inefficient central planning of the state-run economy and the effect of the decades-old U.S. trade embargo.

But the country has also had to cut back on imports over the past three years due to cash shortfalls resulting from problems with its deals with former and current leftist allies, in particular declining aid from crisis-stricken Venezuela.

Whenever chicken arrives at supermarkets in Havana these days, long queues quickly form and do not peter out until the stock is exhausted.
Communist Party leader Raul Castro on Wednesday warned the economic situation could worsen in coming months as the United States further tightens its sanctions on the island although it would not become as dire as in the 1990s.
Reporting by Sarah Marsh; Editing by Cynthia Osterman

“Now the shortage of eggs in Cuba has truly ended,” Yaquelín Orta posted on Facebook. “With one ostrich egg per family distributed as part of the ration card, everything is fixed.”
lol.

“Now the shortage of eggs in Cuba has truly ended,” Yaquelín Orta posted on Facebook. “With one ostrich egg per family distributed as part of the ration card, everything is fixed.”
Orta, from Cienfuegos in central Cuba, added that her family had spent weeks looking to buy a “carton of eggs” without luck.

“There’s no chicken, beef, ground beef, eggs, oil. We are suffering more than a chained-up dog, and on television they only talk about exceeding the quotas and now about ostriches,” she said in a telephone interview from Cienfuegos. “Now you will see that the tourists will get the meat and we’ll get the bones for soup.”

The shortages of basic products, chronic because of the perennial crisis in the Cuban economy, have sharpened recently because of the ongoing political crisis in Venezuela and cooling relations with Brazil, where Cuba bought most of the chicken consumed on the island.

Mayra Ocampo, also from Cienfuegos, recalled the crisis known as the “Special Period,” when Cuba lost its subsidies following the collapse of the former Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Like many Cubans, she fears that the long power blackouts and “ground beef of soy” will return if the Nicolás Maduro regime in Caracas collapses.
“In those years, people got sick because they didn’t eat. We had nothing. Fidel distributed chicks on the ration card to raise them at home. Those who got hens were supposed to have eggs. Mine died because I had nothing to feed them. I lived on a fifth floor and they made a mess all over,” Ocampo said.

Years later, Fidel Castro started experimenting with soy, re-branding it as vegetable protein and putting it on every school menu. And before he died the former commander-in-chief stubbornly focused on the moringa bush, which in his words provided an “endless source of meat, eggs and milk.”
Also famous on the island were the miniature cows, the size of goats, which could be raised in urban areas and produce milk that the government could no longer provide.

“There was a time when the only thing you could buy in the butcher shop was claria,” said Ocampo, referring to a type of catfish. “But now we don’t even have that, because they’re exporting it, they say, to Japan.”
Claria was introduced to Cuba in the 1990s because of their quick reproduction and to fill the growing demand for fresh fish. It is raised in freshwater ponds but can crawl on land, is considered one of the world’s 100 most invasive species and has left the island without trout, biajaca and other endemic freshwater species.

“Even the storm drains get clogged with so many clarias,” Ocampo said. “Because they can survive out of the water, those animals wipe out everything. I hope the ostriches are not the same.”

Cuba leader Raúl Castro, right, embraces Commanders of the Revolution Guillermo García Frías, center, and Ramiro Valdés Menéndez, left, at an event celebrating Revolution Day in 2012. Ramon Espinosa AP
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By Mario J Pentón - Miami Herald.

A comandante of the Cuban Revolution, Guillermo García Frías, unveiled a new strategy for easing the island’s food shortage: to raise African ostriches, animals that offer "much more meat" than cows. By Cuban TV

The list of meandering ideas for resolving Cuba’s food shortage is long: rabbits, chicken, miniature cows, buffalo, catfish and the so-called miraculous moringa bush used to make tea and other so-called nutritious treats.
The newest miracle food unveiled last week by Guillermo García Frías, a 91-year-old comandante of the Cuban Revolution: African ostriches.
“The ostrich is imported. It’s not native to our country. And this ostrich produces more than a cow,” García Frías said as a guest on a Cuban television program.

And just in case some skeptics were not persuaded, García Frías provided the details: “An ostrich lays 60 eggs. From those 60 eggs, our experience is that we get 40 chicks. Those 40 chicks provide four tons of meat after one year, while one cow produces one calf and after a year it’s only a yearling,” he said.

To take full advantage of this new finding, Cuba is developing seven ostrich farms around the island. Some already have been built in the provinces of Holguín, Santiago de Cuba, Guantánamo, Granma and Havana, and another will soon open in the Isle of Youth, the comandante said. The first ostriches, of the blue, red and black-necked families, were imported from Mexico in 1997 and were later cross-bred.

García Frías, director of the government-owned National Company for Flora and Fauna, also told the TV audience about plans to develop cattle production with 30,000 cows. He added that the island is also breeding crocodiles and that Cubans could also start to eat nutria, native rodents also known as cane rats that have “a level of protein superior to all other meats and a high quality pelt.”
His announcement of the ostrich farms was quickly met with sarcasm, jokes and memes on social media.
“Now the shortage of eggs in Cuba has truly ended,” Yaquelín Orta posted on Facebook. “With one ostrich egg per family distributed as part of the ration card, everything is fixed.”

Orta, from Cienfuegos in central Cuba, added that her family had spent weeks looking to buy a “carton of eggs” without luck.
“There’s no chicken, beef, ground beef, eggs, oil. We are suffering more than a chained-up dog, and on television they only talk about exceeding the quotas and now about ostriches,” she said in a telephone interview from Cienfuegos. “Now you will see that the tourists will get the meat and we’ll get the bones for soup.”

The shortages of basic products, chronic because of the perennial crisis in the Cuban economy, have sharpened recently because of the ongoing political crisis in Venezuela and cooling relations with Brazil, where Cuba bought most of the chicken consumed on the island.
Mayra Ocampo, also from Cienfuegos, recalled the crisis known as the “Special Period,” when Cuba lost its subsidies following the collapse of the former Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Like many Cubans, she fears that the long power blackouts and “ground beef of soy” will return if the Nicolás Maduro regime in Caracas collapses.

“In those years, people got sick because they didn’t eat. We had nothing. Fidel distributed chicks on the ration card to raise them at home. Those who got hens were supposed to have eggs. Mine died because I had nothing to feed them. I lived on a fifth floor and they made a mess all over,” Ocampo said.
Years later, Fidel Castro started experimenting with soy, re-branding it as vegetable protein and putting it on every school menu. And before he died the former commander-in-chief stubbornly focused on the moringa bush, which in his words provided an “endless source of meat, eggs and milk.”

Also famous on the island were the miniature cows, the size of goats, which could be raised in urban areas and produce milk that the government could no longer provide.

“There was a time when the only thing you could buy in the butcher shop was claria,” said Ocampo, referring to a type of catfish. “But now we don’t even have that, because they’re exporting it, they say, to Japan.”

Claria was introduced to Cuba in the 1990s because of their quick reproduction and to fill the growing demand for fresh fish. It is raised in freshwater ponds but can crawl on land, is considered one of the world’s 100 most invasive species and has left the island without trout, biajaca and other endemic freshwater species.
“Even the storm drains get clogged with so many clarias,” Ocampo said. “Because they can survive out of the water, those animals wipe out everything. I hope the ostriches are not the same.”

Cuba leader Raúl Castro, right, embraces Commanders of the Revolution Guillermo García Frías, center, and Ramiro Valdés Menéndez, left, at an event celebrating Revolution Day in 2012. Ramon Espinosa AP

Read more here: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article229082734.html#storylink=cpy

Dated 2011:

Hard times mean Cuban coffee tastes of peas again
This article is more than 7 years old
Cuba authorities bring back coffee mixed with peas in response to rising global coffee prices

The rising price of coffee has led to Cuba bringing back coffee mixed with roasted peas. Photograph: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

For some it had the acrid smack of austerity, for others it was a delicious brew that tasted just right. Either way, coffee mixed with roasted peas is returning to Cuba.

Authorities have announced the resumption of the special blend, a venerable money-saving tactic, in response to rising global coffee prices and Cuba's economic crunch.
"It has been decided to once again produce coffee mixed with peas for the rationed quota," a trade ministry note said in the communist party newspaper Granma.

In the past year Robusta coffee prices had jumped 69% to $2,904 a tonne, it said, while peas had climbed merely 30%, to $500 a tonne.
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With President Raul Castro trying to shake up the centrally planned economy so that "two plus two equals four", the conclusion was inescapable: bring back the peas.

Cuba had long mixed coffee with roasted peas to stretch supplies after coffee production slumped, and then collapsed, following the 1959 revolution.

The brew is less potent and more bitter than pure coffee, which Cubans tend to drink with lots of sugar. "It's got a thin, sharp taste. I never liked it," said Isa Morena, a guesthouse owner in Havana. "It didn't help that we had no choice. It was that or nothing."

But when the pure stuff returned to the monthly ration book in 2005, amid an economic upturn, some complained it was unfamiliar and tasted funny. "I like it better with peas," Juan Hernandez Pedroso, a street sweeper, told AP. "I don't know, maybe it's because it's what I'm used to." Some Cubans in the US have shunned Starbucks and continued to home-brew the pea version.

As an additional cost-saving measure the trade ministry cut the monthly coffee ration for young children. "The rationed quota issued to consumers up to six years of age will be terminated. These measures will be applied as of this month." The measures mean that the government can keep distributing 115g bags of coffee, at a subsidised price of 17 cents each, to the population.

The island used to produce 60,000 tonnes of beans annually and was reputedly the world's top exporter in the 1940s, but output shrivelled after the plantations were nationalised. Labour shortages, negligence, incompetence and lack of incentives due to low prices all played a part.

After a record low of 5,500 tonnes in 2009 a modernisation effort boosted production to around 6,700 tonnes last year. That still left a big shortfall filled with $47m worth of imports, Castro told the national assembly last December.

The island could not afford that this year, said the president, and it was an "unavoidable necessity" to once again blend coffee with peas. He hoped the measure would inspire productivity.

"If we want to continue drinking pure, unrationed coffee, the only solution is to produce it in Cuba, where it is proven that all the conditions exist for its cultivation, in sufficient quantities that satisfy our demand and enable us even to export it."