Havana, Feb 4th.- As a "transversal theme that gathers all the essences and policies of the economic and social life of the country", defined the member of the Political Bureau and prime minister, Manuel Marrero Cruz, the Government Program to correct distortions and revive the economy during 2025, approved by the members of the Council of Ministers at the first meeting of this year’s highest governing body, The meeting was led by the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Party and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez.
In presenting the main elements defining the program, the Head of Government recalled that the proposals for objectives and projections had been presented and approved at the Council of Ministers held last December, the working system and the steps for its elaboration.
The fact, he said, allows us to expand the scope of actions and move from government projections to this government program that is composed of objectives, projections, actions, indicators and targets, schedule with dates of compliance and responsibilities.
There were many previous exchanges at all levels before this moment came, said Marrero Cruz, who also highlighted the contribution that they had to enrich the Program with the different considerations and recommendations received, the application of science and research results.
The Council of Ministers approved a detailed plan of actions for its implementation, with special emphasis on the new mechanism for the management, control and allocation of currencies for all economic actors; the implementation of the foreign exchange market, and the partial dollarization of the economy.
These projections, said Marrero Cruz, are vital to the rest of the Government’s Program, especially because of their impact on two key objectives: «Increase and diversify the country’s external income» and «The increase in national production, with emphasis on food».
In general, he stressed the importance of consolidating a system of «work that allows us sustainability in the monitoring and control of what we have planned» and for this it is essential to constant analysis at all levels, the progress of measures that have the greatest impact on the population and communities.
The first topic of the meeting, as usual since last year, was devoted to assessing the state of implementation of the Government Projections to correct distortions and revive the economy in 2024 and in January 2025.
In general, regarding what was done in 2024, the First Deputy Minister of Economy and Planning, Mildrey Granadillo de la Torre, assured that, of the 101 projections contained in the Plan of Actions to achieve the eight objectives, 51 are approved and in the process of implementation, including the development of social programs such as those associated with attention to demographic dynamics, the advancement of women, and care for children, adolescents and youth.
Specifically in 2025, she detailed that, among other topics, the analysis of proposals to strengthen the attributes of the Mariel Special Development Zone as a place for attracting foreign direct investment was advanced; the proposal for a procedure for implementing the Resolution of the Ministry of Internal Trade on the activity of non-state economic actors in commerce was presented, and monitoring was continued, The importance of this for the implementation of the new mechanism for management, control and allocation of currencies and the proposal for the official exchange market.
Continuing education plan
As part of the agenda for the meeting, the Curriculum for the Continuation of Studies of Ninth-Grade Graduates, Pre-University and Other Sources was adopted, in whose elaboration territorial governments participated, the provincial training and employment committees for skilled workers and the training and advisory bodies.
The comprehensive policy on children, adolescents and youth was taken into account as a basis for the design of the plan; the guarantee of continuing education to all graduates; the demands of graduates for investment development and service export in the health sector, as well as the government planning process to improve training planning and skilled labor distribution with training bodies.
According to the meeting:
There are planned 109,891 places, of which 47% are for pre-university education, which increase in general terms compared with the previous year, although it decreases in provinces such as Ciego de Ávila, Las Tunas and Santiago de Cuba, as well as in the special municipality of Isla de la Juventud.
In the structure of entry to technical and vocational education, 49,280 places are available for intermediate-level technician specialties and 8,795 for skilled workers.
The allocation of places favors priority sectors in the food, health, construction, energy, tourism, pharmaceutical and railway programs.
The day course of higher education was designed to provide 54,547 places for higher and technical courses.
For the technical technician, 12,457 places are provided by the higher management bodies, agencies and organizations, with 77% of the places concentrated in the Ministry of Public Health, with a total of 22 courses.
In the case of teaching and medical science courses, although they show a 5% decrease compared with the previous period, they constitute 59% of all places offered in higher education.
The project, as described by the Minister of Labor and Social Security, Marta Elena Feitó Cabrera, who presented the case, guarantees continuity of studies to all graduates of the ninth grade, The Ministry of Education and Science has a special role to play in the development of vocational training.
On the subject, the Minister of Higher Education, Walter Baluja García, considered that it directly impacts on the development of the nation. «A country that is committed to a governance system based on science and innovation must, in the medium and long term, commit itself to increasing the enrolment of young people at universities».
In this regard, he drew attention to a group of factors associated with the socio-economic reality of the country, the blockade, the passage of the pandemic and others that have deteriorated this enrolment rate, which also influences aspects such as academic efficiency.
One of the greatest challenges that has the Cuban educational system, he said, is to do a «vocational and professional guidance work that allows us to increase the number of students who intend to access and access higher education in the coming years».
Other items on the agenda
At the meeting, where members of the Council of Ministers also approved the Agenda for this year’s discussion, both in the governing body itself and in its executive committee, the Prime Minister referred to: Among other matters, the development of municipal assemblies of the People's Power to discuss the Plan of the Economy and the State Budget for this year.
At these meetings, he stressed that despite the work done, there are still shortcomings which we have time to correct and clarify. In this connection, he pointed out that not all plans and budgets submitted clearly define alignment with the municipal development strategy; maintenance and repair plans do not always take into account the views of voters, and actions to continue working in the changing neighborhoods.
And while it is often satisfactory that actions to increase revenues and also to reduce costs have been included, the regions are not always reflected in the search for greater production on the basis of the potential of the territories to meet the demands of the population.
Artificial intelligence to the debate
As the closing of the meeting of the Council of Ministers, in which the main leaders of the Party and the Government of all the territories, the Communications Minister, participated by video conference, Mayra Arevich Marín, presented the Strategy for the development and use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Cuba, which is part of the Digital Transformation Policy of the country.
Ethics and regulatory framework, human capital, its applications and services, public administration, science and innovation, and social communication are the six main axes of the Cuban strategy, that in its projections the gradual and increasing incorporation of IA into everyday processes, prioritizing those that impact on the economy and social welfare, with responsibility and managing the ethical challenges involved in their use and development.
Despite the many challenges involved in the development of the IA, especially for a country with economic constraints that Cuba has, the President of the Republic emphasized on the priority to be placed on its development, the preparation must be suitable, revolutionary and innovative.
In this regard, she stressed the importance of clearly defining how each agency and institution is presenting specifically what it is doing in terms of digital transformation and what it is doing in terms of artificial intelligence, the latter with a possibility of raising productivity to very high levels in the processes where it is applied».
For a country like ours, she explained, today is «extremely attacked, blocked, that we are preparing to face an hegemonic policy ultra-conservative, dominant and of contempt towards the peoples of America, the optimization that we can do all our processes is very important, and that we have to solve it, among other things, with the right use, I would say with a revolutionary, also innovative use of artificial intelligence, and for that the first thing we have to have is a culture on artificial intelligence».
From the Palace of the Revolution, also the working day was an exchange with the main authorities of the provinces that in recent months were affected by the passage of hurricanes Oscar, which impacted the Guantanamo’s territory; and Rafael, which struck the western provinces of Artemisa, Havana and Mayabeque.
The situation in Santiago de Cuba and Granma was also reviewed, following the severe damage caused by earthquakes at the end of last year.
Each territory reported on the current status of different sectors affected by natural phenomena, the problems that have been solved, as well as how much remains to be done to continue progress in recovery. (Text and Photo: Cubadebate)