rted goods and an increasingly worthless currency. By 1994 the official exchange rate of 1 peso to the U.S. dollar no longer disguised the exchange rate on the streets--130 pesos per dollar. The average monthly wage in Cuba was 160 pesos, which was "not enough to buy a pound of pork," and the black market in dollars and goods grew so rapidly that it was beyond government control. The government could have cut demand through massive devaluation of the peso to its black-market level but the devaluation and the accompanying depreciation of real salaries would have been even more disastrous than the existing situation. A similar move by Russia in 1992 had produced a year-end inflation rate of 2,500 percent and the Cuban economy could not absorb such shocks without immense support from the International Monetary Fund or some other international source--support that would not be forthcoming in light of the American economic embargo.
The Cuban government had already opened the country to increased foreign direct investment in tourism and mining and
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