This is not a good start to the planting season.

[El Presidente]

 

 

 

[NSXCIGAR]

Hopefully nothing's in the ground yet...

[Spaceman Spiff]

Sheesh, poor Cuba, it's been a rough go lately. ?

[BellevilleMXZ]

I'm seeing that the covid travel restrictions, have in some way saved me....we were supposed to fly out tomorrow!! Not feeling near as bad as I was now. Hopefully it does not get to bad for them!!

[DBNInc]

When it rains, it pours!

[Kaptain Karl]

Looking at windy.com the growing region is gonna make it out of this really well. Only 2 inches of rain forecasted for the next 10 days. 

[Nino]

Guess the "tropical depression" hitting PdR is not the biggest concern there right now.

There is a serious Covid outbreak in PdR and yesterday 558 infected people were in isolation as they have 21 hot-spots in the area.
They "felt safe" and thought "Coronavirus was a City problem" and weren't ready for it.

Quote

En el área de Vueltabajo, famosa por sus cultivos de tabaco, la vida y los campos también se han puesto en pausa con 21 focos desperdigados por el territorio. "Aquí nos creíamos que el coronavirus era una cosa de las ciudades, de donde vive mucha gente junta, y no estábamos preparados", reconoce Lázaro Rodríguez, un vecino cercano a San Juan y Martínez.

Problem is, according to this article, that people are not there to plant the seeds and do the work.

https://www.14ymedio.com/cuba/Campos-Pinar-Rio-epicentro-pandemia_0_2979901988.html

Or to do the "despalillo" and the sorting of last year's harvest :

Quote

"Aquí estábamos en medio de la escogida y el despalillo de tabaco y todo eso ha tenido que pararse", añade Rodríguez. "Mucho de ese trabajo se hace en el interior de las casas de tabaco y normalmente nosotros tenemos trabajadores contratados que nos ayudan, pero ahora no pueden salir de sus barrios o de sus casas porque están en cuarentena"

 

[Nino]

This is some funny heading for a Depression - looks like a drunk driver...

And would avoid hitting PdR in full force.

 

[NSXCIGAR]

Looking like it's staying east of Havana at this point and will not hit PDR that hard at all.

[Nino]

Some footage from Cuban state tv news from yesterday in PdR - looks like it hit hard and they talk about tobacco seeds being hit ...
 

 

[helix]

Looks tough. Still time to re-plant ? Seedlings available?

[NSXCIGAR]

Looks like they did get hit a bit hard. It's early enough that they should be able to recover for the season. I doubt anything was in the ground yet but perhaps the greenhouses with the seedlings took some damage?

[Nino]

9 hours ago, NSXCIGAR said:

Looks like they did get hit a bit hard. It's early enough that they should be able to recover for the season. I doubt anything was in the ground yet but perhaps the greenhouses with the seedlings took some damage?

Yep, correct - they mention "semilleros" in the report = seedling greenhouses.

[Nino]

More footage from Cuban TV - the flooding damage as seen from the air, looks quite bad.
 

 

[helix]

That is extensive flooding wow. GLTA.

[Vitola Corleone]

That is really a shame and I hope people are ok or as ok as possible.

What % of tobacco for this year's cigars comes from this year's growth? Are they able to smooth out the effect over a few years or will it translate 1:1 into this year's cigar production?