by Elena Maffei Research Associate at the Council on Hemispheric
Affairs The recent discovery of offshore oilfields in the Gulf
of Mexico has given Havana new hopes of establishing rich
deposits of its own, thereby decreasing Cuba’s present
dependence on foreign energy sources. Fidel Castro began to look
for new energy suppliers immediately upon coming to power in
1959, and he soon found one. The Soviet Union was Cuba’s largest
supplier of energy resources during the Cold War, but Moscow’s
collapse in the early 1990s, coupled with the longstanding
American embargo, drove the Cuban economy into a deep
depression. Havana, in response, has begun implementing market-
based reforms, including intensifying efforts to open the
country to tourism, as well as encourage strategic partnerships
with other Latin American countries, most notably Venezuela. In
2011, Cuba produced about 55,000 onshore barrels of oil per day,
mostly from the northern province of Matanzas, refining it at
the island’s four refineries (in Cabaigu