Cuba opens door to more private business, but red tape looms

By ANDREA RODRÍGUEZ
Associated Press

HAVANA (AP) — Opening a small business is a bureaucratic headache in many parts of the world. In Cuba, it’s an adventure in largely unknown territory. Most sorts of private businesses have been banned for more than 50 years, even if hundreds of thousands of Cubans in recent years have taken advantage of reforms that opened up cracks for small private enterprise in the once-solid wall of the state-dominated socialist economy. Now, after five years of waiting, a new legal system takes effect on Sept. 20 that could greatly expand the scope of private businesses, and crucially give them greater legal certainty in efforts to help an economy in crisis.