Taking into account the soil and climatic conditions and the traditions of each territory, 101 Cuban fruit grower cooperatives will pursue to cultivate around 53 different fruits, as reported by the Cuban News Agency.
These entities are located in 96 municipalities and the list includes not only Credit and Service Cooperatives (CCS) and Agricultural Production (CPA), but also Basic Production Units (UBPCs) and in very specific cases, some State Farms.
The fruits to be cultivated the most are mango, guava, avocado, coconut, mammee apple, cherimoya, papaya, soursop, cherry, loquat, sugar apple and plum.
According to Rodriguez Nodals, the productive units in semi-arid areas will introduce fruit suitable to those conditions which have not been cultivated yet, such as date and pitahaya.
Growing citrus fruits like lemon, sour orange, cajel orange, mandarin and lime will be challenging, due to problems caused by existing diseases.
It was proposed to plant no less than 20 different fruit species during the first stage of the programme, which will last until January 2016.
The producers to be in charge of the planting have also been chosen, with no less than 20 hectares per cooperative, and a call was made to collect seeds from rare or nearly extinct species.