Chinese Government provides funding for the Cuban Fruit and Vegetable Processing Plant Project

In 2015, the Bureau of International Economic Cooperation of China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) in 2015 awarded a bid to China National Machinery Industry Corporation (Sinomach) to implement a Chinese Government-aided project, the Cuban Fruit and Vegetable Processing Plant Project. The purpose of this project was to transform a tomato workshop in a canned vegetable processing plant and to construct a tomato processing production line with a capacity of 300 tons per day (mostly for tomatoes, but also mango and guava seasonally), and a stand-up pouch packaging production line with a capacity of 25 packages per minute in Ciego de Ávila Province. Sinomach was responsible for the design, supply, installation, and commissioning of the automated bag packaging production line, the tomato processing production line, and related equipment. It was also charged with proposing the technical requirements and providing the technical parameters for the production line and equipment installation. A working group from MOFCOM visited Cuba in late August 2016 and had consultations with Cuban officials and those involved in the implementation of the project. On June 12, 2018, the Chinese Government and the Cuban Food Industry Group (Spanish: Grupo Empresarial de la Industria Alimentaria, (GEIA)), a state-owned Cuban company, signed a supplementary agreement on the Cuban Fruit and Vegetable Processing Plant Project. After the signing ceremony, the two parties discussed the progress of the project.

Additional details

The Chinese project title is 古巴果蔬罐头加工厂项目 or 古巴果蔬罐头加工厂项目（EPC). It appears the Chinese Government committed financing to this project by 2015, as China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) was awarding the bid for the aid project. The actual form of the aid - be it grant financing or loans - is unknown. This issue merits further investigation.

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