The Cuban Minister of Agriculture, Gustavo Rodriguez, told ACN that most of these areas are used for livestock raising and for vegetable and fruit growing purposes.

He pointed out that the process of approval of applications is still slow and that there are delays in the assessment of the annual agreement among usufruct beneficiaries, the municipal delegate, the director of the agricultural and livestock enterprise, and the president of the cooperative to which the producer is linked.

Luis Suarez, one of these new beneficiaries ––who is already collecting the results of its first tomato, papaya and sweet potato harvests––, told ACN that this is a dream come true for him.

He added that now there is a lot to study in order to implement the best techniques as to agricultural work and sanitary conditions in accordance to the kind of crop.

According to data from the Ministry of Agriculture, by the end of December 2010 the government had granted 1,179,795 hectares in usufruct and had received more than 155,000 applications, out of which over 128,000 were approved and another 19,000 were pending from approval.