Tournament: Arlington | Round: 1 | Opponent: Opponent | Judge: Judge
Advantage One: Agriculture
Cuban agro-ecology is at risk – it’s the only model for adaptation to future agricultural challenges without mass food shortages
Raj Patel, Fellow at the Institute for Food and Development Policy, 2012
(April, What Cuba Can Teach Us About Food and Climate Change, www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/future_tense/2012/04/agro_ecology_lessons_from_cuba_on_agriculture_food_and_climate_change_.single.html)
The Studebakers plying
stuck in the past.
Access to the US market is key to the continued viability of Cuban organics
William Kost, Economist at the US Department of Agriculture, 2004
(CUBAN AGRICULTURE: TO BE OR NOT TO BE ORGANIC?, http://www.ascecuba.org/publications/proceedings/volume14/pdfs/kost.pdf)
For the U.S. organic
just not available.
Lifting the embargo is critical for investment in Cuban organoponics and leads to US adoption which fuels worldwide adoption
Jacob Shkolnick, JD Candidate at Drake, Fall 2012
(SIN EMBARGO: n1 THE CUBAN AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION AND WHAT IT MEANS FOR THE UNITED STATES” 17 Drake J. Agric. L. 683, lexis)
While investment in
agriculture to flourish.
Increasing investment prevents Cuban backsliding
M. Dawn King, Professor of Environmental Studies at Brown, 3/21/12
(Cuban Sustainability: The Effects of Economic Isolation on Agriculture and Energy, wpsa.research.pdx.edu/meet/2012/kingmdawn.pdf
Cuba needed an
and energy needs.
Lifting the embargo won’t cause Cuban abandonment of agroecology - they’ll be able to outcompete industrial models and promote global adoption
Christina Cornell, Research Associate at Council on Hemispheric Affairs, 4/17/09
(Cuba Elevates Urban Gardening to a Cause, http://www.thecuttingedgenews.com/index.php?article=11525)
Many worry whether
transactions and trade.
Global food shortages risk extinction from starvation and war
Julian Cribb, Professor in Science Communication at the University of Technology Sydney, 2010
(Julian, principal of JCA, fellow of the Australian Academy
of Technological Sciences and Engineering, “The Coming Famine: The
Global Food Crisis and What We Can Do to Avoid It”, pg 10
The character of
than global warming."
Energy intensive agriculture is the primary cause of environmental degradation
Dale Allen Pfeiffer, Geologist, science journalist, and editor of From the Wilderness, 10/3/2003
(Eating Fossil Fuels, www.organicconsumers.org/corp/fossil-fuels.cfm)
Just when agricultural
in ecosystem stress.
Ecological collapse risks extinction
Anne Ehrlich and Paul Ehrlich, Professor of Biology and Senior Research Scientist at Stanford, 1/9/13 (Can a collapse of global civilization be avoided?,Proceedings of the Royal Society Biological Sciences, Proc. R. Soc. B 2013 280)
But today, for
from resource use 26
Advantage Two: Collapse
Only a complete rollback of the embargo can buy time for Raul’s reforms to succeed preventing a Cuban implosion and increased terrorist activity
Timothy Ashby, Senior Research Fellow at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, 3/29/13
(PRESERVING STABILITY IN CUBA AFTER NORMALIZING RELATIONS WITH THE UNITED STATES – THE IMPORTANCE OF TRADING WITH STATE-OWNED ENTERPRISES, www.coha.org/preserving-stability-in-cuba-timothy-ashby/
Cuba under Raúl
well as SOEs.
Terrorists operating out of a destabilized Cuba will launch successful attacks throughout the hemisphere
Tim Gorrell, Lieutenant Colonel in the US Army, 3/18/05
(CUBA: THE NEXT UNANTICIPATED ANTICIPATED STRATEGIC CRISIS?” www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA433074)
In the midst
potential future problems.
Terrorists will have access to Cuban Bioweapons
Christopher Dodd, Former US Senator, 6/5/02
(CUBA’S PURSUIT OF BIOLOGICAL WEAPONS: FACT OR FICTION? HEARING BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON WESTERN HEMISPHERE, PEACE CORPS AND NARCOTICS, www.fas.org/nuke/guide/cuba/sfrc060502.pdf)
The well-respected
own national security.
Extinction
John Steinbruner, Senior Fellow at Brooking, 98
(Biological weapons: A plague upon all houses, Foreign Policy, http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/1149464.pdf?acceptTC=true)
It is a considerable
as a whole.