PUBLICATION DATE: May 14, 2004

    SUMMARY

   1. With its 40 healthy years

   2. Equipment for protection against electric discharges in production

   3. Las Tunas (eastern province) to increase rice production

   4. RETOMED Company gaining space in international market

   5. Significant investments in oil sector

The workers of Planta Mecanica¹  celebrated the 40 years of foundation of that factory with a production of equipment, steels and spare parts, with a value surpassing the 7 million Cuban pesos in the first four months of this year. This plant was the first industry inaugurated by Major Ernesto Guevara in Cuba, on May 3, 1964.

Heriberto Vega Betancourt, General Director of the organization, emphasized that in the first 4 months of this year they have produced 450 tons of steel structures destined to construction works in Villa Clara's Northern keys. They also made equipment and pieces such as crowns for sugar mills, scrapers and blades for combined cutter machines, and storage centers, among other necessities of the sugar industry.

In the last few years, this industry exported several components of steel and aluminum to Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Mexico, Panama, Venezuela, Costa Rica and Italy.

1: Mechanical Plant, an important mechanical enterprise located near Santa Clara, Villa Clara, central region of Cuba, mostly devoted to the sugar sector.

Go Top 

  2. EQUIPMENT FOR PROTECTION AGAINST ELECTRIC DISCHARGES ARE BEING PRODUCED

Protectors for equipment and routes against electrical discharges are being exposed by the National Company of Drilling and Constructions in the V International Hall of Technologies and Products of the Water, EXPOAGUA 2004, event in session since Tuesday in the Palace of the Conventions, Havana.

"As the industrial society modernizes", - Jose Morejon Alvarez,  director of the organization pertaining to the National Institute of Hydraulic Resources commented to Granma² reporter - , "the use of articles with electronic components increases and, with it, sensitivity to high tensions and discharges of diverse origins, like rays; thus, these equipment are directed to resist such risks".

In the last few years the Company has consolidated in the provision of lightning rods and protectors against electrical discharges to the pumping stations and water chlorination, as well as other national organizations.

"When making these devices in our factories", said the director, "we help replacing imports and we save hard currency to the country, because we commercialize them to half the price they have in the international market, with quality recognized and great acceptance by the buyers".

Among the works just concluded, Morejon mentioned the aqueduct of Manzanillo and wells for the cleaning of the capital and the city of Cardenas, in addition to others directed to reduce the effects of the drought in Camagüey, Las Tunas, Holguin, Granma, Santiago de Cuba and Guantanamo.

2: Cuban diary edited in Havana.

Go Top 

By means of the movement of popularization of the rice culture, the Cuban Eastern province of Las Tunas anticipates to rise this year its production of the cereal until 9 400 tons, a number that will represent a growth of 27%.

As part of a national program, rice seedtime in small parcels began to be developed in Las Tunas in 1996, generally in previously unproductive areas. Among the advantages of the rice culture in small areas upon the state production in great extensions, is the possibility of using the organic traction animal, installments and the biological fight (campaigns to destroy weed and plagues), techniques that are economic and preserve the environment.

During the past year Cuba garnered nearly 300 000 tons of rice for national consumption, most of them by means of the popularization of the culture, that already includes more than 140 000 producers in all the Island.

The increase maintained in the national harvests of the coveted grain will make possible to reduce imports and to satisfy in the future the country's necessities,   that consumes annually more than 500 000 tons.

Go Top 

RETOMED Company, located in the province of Santiago of Cuba, consolidates positions in the international market with the commercialization of its products.

In recent date, the organization received the "Better Exporter" Prize of the Siderurgical and Mechanic Industry, as result of the fulfillment of the contracted commitments. In that sense is emphasized the quality of the modules of fisiotherapy and rehabilitation delivered to Venezuela, as well as the clinical furniture and other accessories for Haiti.

Towards the South American country the company sent stairs with banister, angled table, shoulder wheel, universal hand tables and ministairs, while for a hospital of the neighboring Caribbean nation it exported beds, transporter of clinical histories, sinks, carriages and display cabinets for medicines.

The quality management system of the company is certified with norms ISO 9001:2000 and its reach includes the four productive units: aluminum carpentry, office and store furniture, and gastronomical equipment and furniture.

In order to develop the oil production, the country develops a remarkable financial effort by 750 million dollars, destined to a large extent to the prospection and well perforation.

Calculations of the Basic Industry Ministry specify that, endorsed by those resources and the association with foreign companies, the production of hydrocarbon grew in more than seven times during the last decade, which has allowed to diminish its imports.

Matanzas continues being the region with greater development in the oil branch, with 170 wells in operation, followed by the deposits of the north of Havana and Ciego de Avila, while the possible reserves in several zones of the marine platform are being investigated.

An element that distinguishes the Cuban oil development is the care of the environment, being an example in that strategy the deposit next to Varadero spa.

Go Top 

 6. THE ART OF MARKET CONQUEST

For astonishment of the international community, the products of the Cuban biotechnology begin to gain space in that complex market controlled by the great pharmaceutical companies of the First World.

And it is, that as explains the Master in Law Norkis Arteaga, General Manager of the Company CIMAB S.A., in charge of the commercialization of the results of the Center of Molecular Immunology (CIM), to sell a biopharmaceutical product demands to fulfill a series of certifications and extremely strict regulatory norms, which makes the export very difficult of such goods, because only the process of registry in another country can delay years.

Precisely, CIMAB S.A. has just been awarded the National Prize to the Exporter in the category of Medium Company, an stimulation  annually introduced by the Ministry of Foreign Trade.

According to Norkis, in 2003 this house managed to duplicate its plan of exports with respect to the previous year when entering more than six million dollars, which implied a growth of the productive capacity of the Center of Molecular Immunology (CIM), not without fulfilling the internationally demanded quality parameters.

Among the products with greater sales to the external market appear the Recombinant Human Eritropoyetine (ior EPOCIM), a glycoprotein indicated for the treatment of the anemia by different causes, as can be the chronic renal insufficiency, and the so-called Stimulating Factor for Formation of Recombinant Granulocytic Colonies (ior LeuKoCim), that elevates the leukocytes and with it the capacity of the patients to assimilate the chemotherapy treatments.

Another quoted line is the monoclonal antibody iorT3, used in the therapy and prophylaxis of the rejection to the renal transplant, by the way the first scientific result of the CIM that was commercialized abroad.

Licenciate Rafael Magadan, specialist in marketing of CIMAB S.A., and Dr. Mauro Alfonso, commercial manager, expressed to Granma newspaper that at the moment the biopharmaceutical products represented by the company are sold in fourteen countries of Latin America, the Middle East and Asia, while already there are already 40 contracts signed with companies of different regions from the planet, including licensing agreements of patents.

Several of the new more promissory lines, among them therapeutic bovine against the monoclonals cancer and antibodies with identical aims, are used in clinical tests in Canada, Spain and Italy, experience that demonstrates the confidence in the achievements of Cuban science, and opens opportunities to conquer future markets in the developed world.

Within the efforts of CIMAB S.A. to extend its international presence it's opportune to mention the creation of joint ventures in India and China, whose intention is to construct production plants that guarantee the demand of monoclonal antibodies and other biopharmacs for those great populations.

Quality, security and effectiveness in products, joint to the excellence in commercial management, have been the credentials of the success of this company, that has become today one of the main protagonists of the international prestige of Cuban biotechnology.

Go Top

 7. CESIGMA S. A.: SCRUTINIZING THE PLANET

Cesigma S.A., a Cuban-Spanish joint-venture devoted to export of environmental projects and geographic studies, was again nominated this year by the Ministry of Foreign Trade among the services supplier companies whose management in the exports was outstanding during 2003.

The nomination was deserved, for second consecutive year, thanks to the continued effort and remarkable results in its persistence of placing its services in foreign markets such as Dominican Republic, Brazil, Nicaragua and Guatemala, for just mentioning some.

In 1999 it became a mixed capital company, in association with the Spanish CADIC S.A., who operates with own companies in the Iberian Peninsula, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Cuba, Argentina, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Brazil. The Spanish party owns 50 % of the shares, while the other half is distributed among six national institutions.

During the last years, Cesigma has maintained an annual average income that reaches 1.5 million dollars, with a fixed group of ten specialists of high graduation, 14 specialistic branches and other six dedicated to take care of the cabinet of investigation and development, having among them cartographers, physicists, chemistries, biologists, environmentalists, meteorologists, geomorphologists, hidrogeologists, geographers, oceanologists and specialists in teledetection.

In its supplies package appear studies and projects on the environment, civil engineering, surveying, mining, tourism, cadastre, tributary administration, public provision of services and works, planning and urban management, telephony, gas, water, sewage systems, energy, as well as automatic location of vehicles (LAV system) that serves in police bodies, ambulances, urban transport,  cargo transport and taxis.

The social object of the enterprise group is the commercialization and integral execution of services, products and solutions, with the use of current technology, in geographic, cartographic subjects and of the environment, in the national and international market.

Between its products is the Latin m-4t - its most acknowledged tool -, a software conformed by an opened SIG system motor of general purpose, which remains in constant development to offer solutions to the group's production needs.

It has performed numerous studies of environmental impact in the mining, the industry and the tourism in the national territory and other countries, among them Dominican Republic, Mexico, Spain, Guatemala, Brazil, and Nicaragua. The generation of aerospacial orto-images is a service of ortorectification of aerial photographies and images, that include mosaics of images and balance of the color to visualize extensive areas, with experiences in the Iberian Peninsula, Argentina, Guatemala and Cuba.

Other services are: capture of data (scanning and vectorization of planes, topographical surveys by GPS, generation of photo-plans and fotogrametric restitution); digital basic cadastral cartography - topographic and thematic (of urban equipment, service networks, socioeconomic information, among others); cartography generated by the results of space analysis of the GIS, bioremediation (that includes the use of bacteria to reduce the impacts produced by petroleum spills in coastal zones) beach regeneration (fundamentally by means of the artificial sand feeding in Varadero and Dominican Republic); and treatment of residual liquids and solids, from a network of market partners that handle the disposition of remainders by means of modern and compact technologies, of recognized international prestige.

Among its environmental projects are the Study of Environmental Impact for the oil exploration of Repsol YPF Cuba S.A., the hidrogeologic monitoring of nickeliferous deposits for foreign and national companies, and the feasibility studies for the regeneration of beaches in Domin Republic.

Other projects of digital cartography and geographical information systems are the SIG for Brazilian electrical companies, the inventories of assets for the Guatemala Electric Company and the support with ortoimages for the environmental studies in Cuba.

The specialists of Cesigma, whose management, qualification and competition are worth its nomination today, continue deeply engaged in scrutinizing the planet, in search of solutions to preserve the environment, and trusting to get this year the prize by their results.

[FAQs]

[Business Opportunities]

[Directory]

[Site Map]

[Contact  us]