Venezuela sent gasoline and food to Cuba in the last two months, despite shortages in the country

Venezuela has boosted shipments of gasoline and food to Cuba since November, providing key supplies to one of the closest allies of illegitimate President Nicolás Maduro, according to documents from Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA and vessel tracking data from Refinitiv Eikon.

From late November to early January, PDVSA shipped at least three shipments containing about 197,000 barrels of motor gasoline, along with other refined products, to the Cuban ports of Nuevitas, Matanzas and Havana, documents and data show. .

The shipments arrived at the ports of the Caribbean nation aboard the Cuban-flagged tankers María Cristina and Alicia.

PDVSA, the Venezuelan Oil Ministry and the Cuban Foreign Ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

Venezuela had minimized the export of gasoline to Cuba since 2020 amid the drop in its internal production due to the precarious state of the PDVSA refineries. Fuel shortages in the OPEC member nation have left long lines of consumers waiting for gasoline and diesel at stations.

Venezuela and Cuba are under US sanctions, including oil supply and shipping clearance between the nations, for what Washington says are its repressive policies. The governments in Caracas and Havana blame the sanctions for worsening humanitarian conditions in their countries and accuse Washington of trying to overthrow them.

The shipments came amid a rebound in gasoline production in Venezuela. From mid-2020 to mid-2021, Venezuela was forced to turn to Iran for imported gasoline to supplement its domestic production.

But, thanks in part to supplies of units and spare parts from Iran that allowed PDVSA to undertake long-delayed maintenance work on its refineries, Venezuela has increased its production of gasoline blends and components to nearly 160,000 barrels per day (bpd). this year, according to sources.

Venezuela’s total oil supply to Cuba fell last year to 56,300 barrels bpd of crude and refined products and 73,000 metric tons of petcoke, from 76,600 bpd and 100,000 metric tons, respectively, in 2019, according to an analysis by the PDVSA export reports and vessel tracking data.

Venezuela has also exported 222 containers and hundreds of bags of food since December on the ships Icoa Uru and Melba, which unloaded at the Cuban ports of Mariel and Santiago, the documents and data showed.

The recent shipments follow humanitarian deliveries of food and medical equipment to Cuba by Venezuela and Mexico, which were confirmed in August by the island’s authorities.

Russia and China also provided assistance to Havana last year amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Venezuela’s opposition has long criticized the government’s decision to supply fuel to Cuba amid widespread shortages in the country. A lack of sufficient production led PDVSA in 2018 to buy nearly $440 million worth of foreign crude and ship it to Cuba on terms beneficial to the island and often at a loss, a Reuters investigation found.

Cuba, which has faced food and fuel shortages for decades, was in a particularly difficult situation last year, when the coronavirus pandemic hit the island in mid-year, along with widespread protests and shortages of energy and basic supplies.

Maduro, who has visited Cuba twice in recent months, has said that US sanctions on Venezuela and any attempts to block its trade with countries like Cuba are illegal.

The supply of diesel to Cuba was one of the arguments used by the United States to suspend in 2020 the authorizations it had extended for the exchange of oil for fuel, which allowed Venezuela to place its crude on the markets while importing diesel.

The US Treasury Department, which is in charge of administering the sanctions, declined to comment.