Ernesto Lima questions the cost of his root-vegetable purchase in Cienfuegos
The resident said he spent 1,300 Cuban pesos on three sweet potatoes and a piece of squash; other users responded with their own food expenses.
Ernesto Lima, a resident of Cienfuegos, wrote on Facebook that a purchase of root vegetables had cost him 1,300 Cuban pesos and directed his protest over the cost of food at the government. On Friday, November 6, he posted a photograph showing what he had bought: three sweet potatoes and a piece of squash. He wrote that he found living in Cuba difficult and asked how much longer the situation would continue.
Responses included accounts from shoppers who also questioned how much they had to spend to bring food home. One person mentioned a price of 1,000 pesos per pound of bell peppers, while another said that day they had spent 560 pesos on four and a half pounds of sweet potatoes. Another participant said they had paid 1,200 pesos for a chicken leg quarter and considered the amount abusive.
The conversation moved from specific expenses to the difficulties faced by people buying food with wages or pensions. One user said neither the minimum wage nor a pension was enough to cover food and blamed those in power for being aware of the shortages. She also expressed her belief that the authorities monitor social media and read comments in which citizens describe their financial problems.
Another participant connected the effort required to obtain food with the difficulties he said he faced in accessing water and electricity. Questioning official calls for endurance, he said he had gone months without power and also had to find a way to secure food. His response rejected those appeals from the perspective of a daily life marked, in his account, by simultaneous supply and utility problems.
In early November, Barbaro Miranda Hernandez had posted a video showing a squash he priced at 2,700 pesos. That amount was equivalent to 84 percent of the monthly minimum wage, set at 3,210 pesos since July 2026. The earlier case also drew attention to the cost of that food, although it involved a whole squash rather than the piece Lima displayed alongside the sweet potatoes.
High prices for other products have also been reported in different Cuban communities, including both vegetables and animal products. In Sagua de Tanamo, reported prices included 900 pesos per pound of chicken and 3,500 pesos for a carton of eggs.