HAVANA, Feb 05 (IPS) – Jorge Sarmientos mentioned he made funding when he purchased an electrical motorbike to get round and keep away from the nervousness suffered by the customers of Cuba’s poor public transportation system or the excessive costs of personal options.
“It was costly, however I gained independence,” Sarmientos, a Havana-based accountant, advised IPS. “Transportation has by no means been good right here. When there is no such thing as a scarcity of buses, there are shortages of spare components or gas. Costs needs to be lowered or there needs to be amenities for extra folks to amass electrical automobiles.”
Official information point out that half 1,000,000 electrical bikes are on the roads on this Caribbean island nation of 11 million inhabitants, a type of transportation that helps folks and households get round.
Over the past decade, the usage of electrical automobiles has elevated in Cuba, based mostly on customs authorizations for his or her importation.
Extra not too long ago, the home business has begun to assemble completely different fashions, together with electrical bicycles and three-wheelers, utilizing components imported largely from China.
However the truth that they’re primarily bought in overseas forex is a hurdle to increasing gross sales.
The most cost effective fashions in state-owned shops exceed 1,000 {dollars}, whereas others go for as a lot as 6,000 {dollars}.
In Cuba, the common month-to-month wage is equal to about 35 {dollars} in keeping with the official alternate charge, or about 16 {dollars} within the casual market.
In keeping with reviews, nearly 40 hybrid buses (alternating diesel and electrical energy) have been added to Havana’s deteriorated fleet of public buses in recent times, a know-how that saves 25 to 30 % of gas and is much less polluting.
However the extreme inside financial disaster and the scarcity of overseas forex are hindering actions to extend the variety of 100% electrical automobiles in an effort to progressively decarbonize public transportation.
Some corporations and establishments have acquired electrical automobiles, which deliver reductions in upkeep prices.
Native options
Within the case of Havana, from 2019 to 2023 the Neomovilidad venture was carried out, which amongst its aims aimed to strengthen the regulatory framework for an environment friendly transition to a low-emission city transportation system.
Along with prioritizing variables akin to a gender strategy and the inclusion of various age teams, the venture supplied a pilot public bicycle rental station, run by an area growth venture led by younger folks.
It additionally created three routes of three-wheeled electrical ecotaxis pushed primarily by ladies in outlying neighborhoods of Boyeros, one of many 15 municipalities that make up Havana.
The three-wheelers are gentle, motorized automobiles with a capability for six passengers within the again, much like the autorickshaws or tuktuks which might be widespread in Asia. Right here they’re additionally referred to as motocarros or mototaxis.
“I feel they’re an amazing choice for getting round rapidly over brief distances, and at reasonably priced costs,” retiree Gloria Almaguer, a resident of the Fontanar neighborhood in Boyeros, advised IPS. “The dangerous factor is that there should not sufficient to cowl demand, they will carry just a few folks, and there are specific instances of day once they ‘vanish’.”
The Neomovilidad venture was executed by Havana’s Common Directorate of Transportation, carried out by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) workplace in Cuba and financed by the Global Environment Facility (GEF).
Different fleets of ecotaxis present service within the capital’s municipalities of Previous Havana, Central Havana, Guanabacoa, Playa and Plaza de la Revolución, additionally with UNDP help. These are all initiatives that contribute to the nationwide dedication to mitigate local weather change.
With routes starting from two to 4 kilometers and low costs, just a little greater than 100 of those automobiles assist present an answer for sustainable micro-mobility in city areas.
In different Cuban cities, comparable three wheelers with inside combustion engines are in service.
One problem is that the overwhelming majority of ecotaxis and electrical automobiles rely on the nationwide electrical grid to recharge their batteries. The ecotaxis recharge in the course of the night time at their terminals within the parking a number of public entities, and privately owned automobiles accomplish that at their homeowners’ properties.
It’s because to this point there is no such thing as a infrastructure that will permit electrical automobiles to be recharged in a community of service stations.
Round 95 % of Cuba’s electrical energy era depends on fossil fuels.
The federal government considers it a matter of nationwide safety to rework the vitality combine, and goals for greater than 30 % of electrical energy to come back from clear energies by 2030, a purpose that will probably be troublesome to realize because of the want for a excessive stage of funding.
New gas costs
A majority of the Cuban inhabitants is dependent upon the general public transportation system, based mostly primarily on buses and different fossil fuel-consuming automobiles.
In Havana, house to 2.1 million inhabitants, “lower than 300 buses are working, a metropolis that within the Eighties had 2,500 buses and solely 4 years in the past had 600,” mentioned Transport Minister Eduardo Rodríguez Dávila throughout a tv look in October 2023.
The best impression falls on these with the bottom buying energy, since buses are probably the most reasonably priced technique of transportation.
The panorama is comparable in Cuba’s different 14 provinces. Different transport in city, suburban and rural settlements contains modified vehicles, conventional horse-drawn carriages and bicycle cabs which carry one or two passengers and are pedaled by the motive force.
In Havana, estimates place the entire variety of passengers who use non-public transport at round 25 %, usually in outdated U.S.-made automobiles, the so-called “almendrones” – non-public cabs with fastened routes – which run on gasoline or diesel and should not reasonably priced for everybody.
Along with the deterioration of the car fleet, the power scarcity of spare components, lubricants and different provides, and the migration of drivers to sectors with larger financial advantages, the gas scarcity has been one of many predominant causes of the irregular public transportation service, which has been accentuated within the final 5 years.
“You possibly can spend an hour ready, or extra. Lots of instances I am late for sophistication, although I stand up very early. I am unable to afford a personal automotive on daily basis. It is more and more troublesome to get wherever,” pressured structure scholar Yenia Hernández in an interview with IPS, as she waited at a bus cease with dozens of different folks within the Central Havana municipality.
Vitality crises have develop into extra recurrent since 2019, in parallel with the decline of the home financial scenario and the shortage of overseas forex.
In keeping with the authorities, this example has a number of causes, from breach of contract by suppliers to U.S. authorities sanctions that hinder entry to credit score and companies from worldwide banks.
In 2021 Cuba imported 126,000 tons of gasoline, in 2022 some 192,000 tons, and in 2023 round 203,000 tons. Regardless of the rise, the determine stays beneath the demand of about 360,000 tons, Vitality and Mines Minister Vicente de la O Levy mentioned in a televised assertion on Jan. 8.
Alternatively, this island nation wants 1.8 billion {dollars} to cowl its annual diesel wants.
“In 2023, 609,000 tons of diesel could possibly be imported, for about 600 million {dollars} (one third),” added the Vitality and Mines Minister.
As of Feb. 1, a rise within the value of gasoline and diesel was deliberate, in an effort to deliver the promoting value in Cuban pesos in step with the official charge of the greenback, regulate gross sales and promote a portion solely by way of dollar-backed playing cards, in an effort to assure resupply with the overseas forex, in keeping with the federal government.
However the measure was postponed till additional discover on account of a “cybersecurity incident” attributable to “a virus from overseas” that affected the system of gas gross sales, which is being investigated, official data mentioned.
The technique to remove subsidies tasks, as of Mar. 1, a rise in interprovincial transportation fares, with hikes of just about 3 times the price of bus fares and 6 to seven instances the price of practice tickets.
Whereas the fares for a part of the general public transport service will stay unchanged, within the case of Havana, the fare for electrical three wheelers will rise from 4 to 10 pesos (0.03 to 0.08 {dollars}).
The will increase in gas costs and transportation fares are along with the package deal of provisions that features tax and tariff modifications as of Jan. 1 and which, in keeping with authorities officers, are geared toward “rectifying distortions” within the financial system and boosting its restoration.
“The one factor I see is that some transportation will probably be dearer, however there will not essentially be extra automobiles, or extra fashionable automobiles with higher service,” Reynaldo Martín, {an electrical} engineer dwelling in Previous Havana, advised IPS. “Wages stay the identical and meaning I am unable to even dream of shopping for a bicycle.”
© Inter Press Service (2024) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service
World Points Information with Newsmaac
