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Transport minister expects passenger trips to fall 75% in 2026

Eduardo Rodríguez Dávila told the Reuters news agency that Cuban public transport is going through one of its worst moments and projected a 75% drop in passenger trips compared with 2025, along with a collapse in domestic freight from 70 to about 20 million tons.

The transport minister admitted in an interview with Reuters that the public system is going through “one of its worst moments” because of the fuel shortage and the drop in operating vehicles, and estimated that passenger trips will fall 75% compared with 2025. “These are families who cannot move, people who cannot visit sick loved ones, others who cannot get to a hospital. The drama behind these shortages is complex,” he said, in remarks translated by Yamacoa. Diario de Cuba summed up his words as an acknowledgment of the sector's collapse, paired with the promise of electric vehicles.

The figures the minister laid out measure the retreat: daily interprovincial bus departures from Havana fell from 419 in 2025 to 11 in 2026, national bus routes went from more than 100 to 21, and intercity transport could end the year with a 90% drop.

Freight is heading the same way. According to the ministry's projections, Cuba will move close to 20 million tons of domestic freight in 2026, compared with 70 million in 2025, a reduction that affects the distribution of food, medicines and raw materials in a country with supply problems.

The government blames the situation on restrictions on fuel supply, but the data cited in the interview show earlier deterioration: Ómnibus Nacionales made barely 36% in 2024 of the trips it completed in 2019, and in December 2025 only 219 of its 558 buses were running. The shortage worsened from late January, when Venezuela and then Mexico suspended their oil shipments to the island, according to the information gathered by Infobae. In April, Díaz-Canel summed up the situation in one sentence: “There is fuel for almost nothing,” in remarks translated by Yamacoa.

As an alternative, the authorities are pushing electric mobility. Rodríguez Dávila said the country has some 150,000 electric cars, motorcycles, bicycles and tricycles, double the 2025 figure and around 15% of the vehicle fleet, and that in August electric vehicles accounted for 40% of the sector's imports, up from 3.5% in January 2025. The government also acquired 60 solar charging stations. During the press tour, several electric tricycles belonging to a state company sat idle in a garage because there was no electricity to recharge them. “These are the problems we face,” the minister said on seeing the scene, in remarks translated by Yamacoa.

Sources: Infobae · Periódico Cubano · Diario de Cuba · Serie Yamacoa: Afectación eléctrica máxima prevista en el horario pico (Unión Eléctrica (UNE))

Data updated: 2026-10-22T17:15:00.000Z

Transport minister expects passenger trips to fall 75% in 2026 | Yamacoa Observatory