One of the final things the previous Bush administration did last October was to tighten the import ban on Cuban products by barring Americans traveling to Cuba from bringing back up to US$100 worth of Cuban cigars. Now, believe it or not, Americans, who smoke one in two of the world's cigars, are barred even from buying and smoking a Cuban cigar in another country. Everyone knows broadly what's happened in the past 40 years or so since the Cuban embargo was levied: in many countries principally in the Caribbean and Central America, and especially in the Dominican Republic, Honduras and Nicaragua, the cigar manufacturing industries have really taken off. Certainly these countries made cigars before, but it was the exclusion of Cuba from the American market that took them into the front rank, led to the development of quality brands and transformed their economies.
展开▼
