Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of reports that experts from Russia's Stolypin Institute for the Economy of Growth and Cuban Government experts are planning to create a Centre for Economic Transformation together.

We have noted the announcement that Russian and Cuban experts are planning to set up a Centre for Economic Transformation. The British Embassy in Havana often holds meetings with the Cuban Government in which development requirements of the Cuban economy are talked about, including the need and place for private small- and medium-sized businesses in a sustainable economy.