Operations research in Cuba

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Operations research in Cuba INFORMS

Operations research in Cuba A brief history of the development of O.R. teaching and research in the Caribbean nation. By Carlos N. Bouza Herrera and Sira Allende Alonso

The history of Cuba closely follows its relationship with the United States, particularly in regard to the development of O.R. in Cuba.

As a result of the Spanish-American War, Cuba was liberated from Spain in the late nineteenth century. Between 1898 and 1902, a provisional administration of the United States governed Cuba. On May 20, 1902, Cuba achieved its independence. The history of Cuba closely follows the complicated path of the relationship between Cuba and the United States, with a wide variety of shades and colors. While this is true in general, it is also true with regard to the development of the Cuban operations research and statistical communities. Statistics were commonly used in Cuba before 1959, and Cubans and Americans commonly collaborated or extended each https://www.informs.org/ORMSToday/PrivateArticles/AprilVolume42Number2/OperationsresearchinCuba

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other’s research and work. For example, many Cuban physicians studied in the United States during the Cuban colonial period, and many learned about statistics during these studies and returned home to use what they had learned. Renowned Cuban physician Carlos J. Finlay relied heavily on statistics in his efforts to identify the cause of yellow fever. Finlay used statistical data for establishing the existence of a direct relationship between the epochal abundance of mosquitoes and the increase of the number of cases of yellow fever. He then argued that the Aedes aegypti mosquito was the vehicle of transmission of the disease. American Army physician Walter Reed subsequently developed and executed studies that generated evidence in support of Finlay’s theory. When the Secretaria de Salubridad (Health Secretary) of the new republic of Cuba was established with Finlay as the chief health officer of Cuba, it included in its structure a Department of Statistics and provided strong support for statistical studies such as “Estadística Sanitaria en Cuba” (Sanitary Statistics Cuba), published in 1903. Another example of statistical “collaboration” between Cuba and the United States about this time was the exchange of statistics students and professionals, which is credited with bringing to Cuba marketing research techniques commonly used in the United States. As a result, Cuban advertising agencies were established, and these agencies developed and used opinion polls that were administered to samples that were collected in accordance with statistical standards. During the 1950s, Cuba experienced strong https://www.informs.org/ORMSToday/PrivateArticles/AprilVolume42Number2/OperationsresearchinCuba

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and stable development and growth in its business community and its economy. During this period, the Cuban government and business enterprises (mill owners/producers, as well as trade unions) relied heavily on statistical and time-series analysis to predict the price and quotas of sugar and coffee production in the international market. University Reform and Specialization

In the early 1960s, the Universidad de La Habana underwent a profound transformation. The Faculty of Sciences had historically graduated students proficient in physics, chemistry and mathematics. The reform introduced a structure of schools within the faculties. The School of Mathematics, launched within the faculty of Sciences, planned to produce specialists in pure mathematics and applied mathematics, with applied mathematics students specializing in mathematical statistics and numerical analysis. The plan was to produce statisticians who would be capable of providing theoretical support to technical work in ministries and state institutions. In addition, these statisticians would be able to develop investigations in research institutions. This was a rational step for continuing the traditional work in statistics that had been developed in the Cuban medicinal and economic sectors. The mathematical statisticians who graduated from the program were tasked with conducting survey sampling inquiries, designing experiments, analyzing time series and estimating regression models. At this time there were no computing facilities, and the use of computing with calculators was part of the training. Numerical analysts were developed through the program in response to the need for https://www.informs.org/ORMSToday/PrivateArticles/AprilVolume42Number2/OperationsresearchinCuba

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specialists to deal with computing issues. Large Cuban business enterprises commonly had a department of “Mechanical Accounting” that used computing machines for monitoring economic activities. The most popular machines were produced by IBM and empowered by punch cards. The large enterprises included the Cuban Telephone Company (a subsidiary of AT&T) and Compañia Cubana de Electricidad (a subsidiary of a U.S. electric power monopoly). Medium-size enterprises such as sugar factories had smaller departments. Small enterprises with advanced accounting systems used specialized computing businesses to provide these services. The ‘Electronic Brain’

The “Electronic Brain” – an old American machine (RAMAC) – was installed at La Habana in the 1950s, thus creating a need for specialists who were capable of dealing not only with the IBM computers in general and the RAMAC in particular, but also of being able to cope with the emerging technologies. The university’s numerical analysis specialization was designed to graduate this kind of specialist. The first generation of applied mathematicians in these programs took courses from professors who came to Cuba from Czechoslovakia and East Germany, which had a profound impact on the skills Cuban applied mathematicians learned. In the 1960s, these specialists were

Applications of O.R. in Cuba

One of the earliest applications of operations research in Cuba involved strategic planning by the government. In this project, the Universidad de La Habana designed a simulation model of operations of sugar cane mills in 19721974. Statisticians,

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in high demand, and they consequently began immigrating to the United States.

informatics specialists and operation researchers participated in the In the 1970s, Cuba development of this became involved in model, and the the development of Ministry of Sugar modern computing. was the client. UNESCO experts French computers were bought to Cuba, also contributed to the effort. and training in France produced the The development of needed specialists for models for managing working with the emerging industries, computers in Cuba. addressing issues in The IRIS computers transportation and were counterparts to designing networks the IBM 350 and steadily increased as 360. At that general Cuban universities time, the Cuban generated more Ministry of Economy professionals who acquired an English were capable of computer – an Elliot- working on such 805 – and the projects. To further numerical analysis increase Cuba’s students were able to capacity in this area, use this computer for the Minister of some practical Economy launched a applications. It was specialized institute during this decade for dealing with the that Cuba began to development of take note of the computer-aided success of operations systems. Operations research in the research specialists, United States, as well as England, France and economists, were other countries, also recruited by the which motivated the Instituto de launching of an Investigaciones academic Económicas, an specialization in Cuba institute that was that was considered assigned the strategic to be a derivative of task of managing the https://www.informs.org/ORMSToday/PrivateArticles/AprilVolume42Number2/OperationsresearchinCuba

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numerical analysis.

socialist five-year The development of economic plan. the Cuban economy Governmental institutions mimicked required planning that institute and and rational and organized some optimal use of dispositive groups resources. To this end, different Cuban that were primarily ministries organized responsible for the computation of groups that were optimal solutions to responsible for a variety of developing specific operations research problems. Unfortunately, there applications. is no documentation Engineers, of research economists and developed through computer these efforts before programmers were 2000. incorporated into these groups. The In this century, the first task of these Cuban Ministry of groups was to study Economy has established experimented with techniques and apply initiatives aimed at them to real improving the problems that each economy, and again ministry wanted to the use of operations solve. Two important research has been outcomes of this extensive. Cuban movement were the researchers, now establishment of an more experienced, academic have started specialization and an publishing their academic journal research results. (Investigación However, in the Operacional) in current context, operations research. Cuba is still in need As part of this newly established academic specialization in operations research, Cuba organized summer schools (in

of more studies that utilize operations research. Of course, theoretical and practical challenges, both expected and


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collaboration with French institutions) in which the teaching of nonlinear programming, graph theory and other challenging operations research topics was a top priority. Professors developed an accelerated program with the objective of quickly preparing students to become instructors of operations research. In another effort to stimulate the growth in operations research capacity in Cuba, a UNESCOPNUD (Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo, or United Nations Development program) was established in cooperation with La Universidad de LA Habana in 1973. This program promoted research as one of its tasks and supported Cubans with advisors for the schools of the Faculty of Sciences. Experts in operations research visited the School of Mathematics for long periods and taught at both the


unexpected, routinely assert themselves when attempting to improve the efficiency of various aspects of a national economy, and the responsibility for developing sound approaches will fall to Cuban operations researchers, statisticians and mathematicians. The reader may learn of contemporary applications of operations research in Cuba by reviewing articles published by the journal Investigaciòn Operacional. For example, Vilavicencio-Ferrer (2002) discusses the design of new aliment programs for the Ministerio de la Alimentación (Food Ministry). Specific distribution and routing problems have been addressed by Lopez et al. (2004) and Garza et al. (2004a, 2004b). Agricultural studies have generated models of strategic interest in economy (Cortes-Miranda, 2007; Salles et al.,


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undergraduate and graduate level.

2010) and in environment issues (Cortés-Borroto, The Faculty of Technology was also 2007; Cortés et al., 2008; and Pérez involved in this movement through León, et al., 2007). the organization of In the future, Cuba its School of will certainly need Industrial applications of Engineering; operations research, operations research and an increase in was included in this the importance of new school. The operations research is faculty of this school expected. was provided with one of the first IRIS computers from France, and a specialized computer center was built. Young Cuban professors visited English institutions for training and for obtaining MsC’s diplomas, and several English professors stayed in Cuba for months with the Faculty of Technology. Due to the natural relationships with engineering projects, the School of Industrial Engineering dominated the area of applications. At the time, courses on operations research topics, such as linear programming and graphs were taught by the Economics faculty. Research & Collaboration

In the 1970s, collaboration with Berlin’s University Humboldt was extended to operations research. Humboldt placed greater emphasis on theory than did its Cuba counterparts, and its work at that time was primarily in optimization. A long-term collaboration that included the establishment of Cuban MSc. and Ph.D. programs in operations research developed. The main theme across this collaboration was mathematical programming, and the collaboration included the exchange of professors for the development of joint https://www.informs.org/ORMSToday/PrivateArticles/AprilVolume42Number2/OperationsresearchinCuba

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research within its first five years. In the 1980s, professors from the USSR visited Cuba and promoted a similar collaboration with a basis in optimal control theory. With the collapse of the community of socialist countries in Will the normalization of relations the 1990s, between Cuba and the U.S. accelerate O.R. collaboration between colleagues the from these two nations? expected need for using operations research for practical issues decreased dramatically. The academic specialization in operations research was terminated, but the interest in operations research in the universities remained strong. Some courses were maintained in the curricula of the careers of mathematics, engineering, economics and statistics. This stubborn interest in operations research in Cuba motivated the Cuban concept of operations research as a discipline encompassing optimization and statistics, as well as computer science. This tradition is present in the contents of the journal Investigación Operacional, which has been published without interruption since 1966. The journal has on its board associate editors for stochastics, economics, optimization and computing. The associate editors include well-known professors from France, Germany, and Spain; its editorial committee is formed by researchers from the United States, Latin America and several European and Asian nations. Investigaciòn Operacional appears to be the oldest journal specializing in operations research in the region, and it is covered by several refereeing services such as Mathematical Reviews, Zentralblatt fur Mathematik, https://www.informs.org/ORMSToday/PrivateArticles/AprilVolume42Number2/OperationsresearchinCuba

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International Abstracts of Operations Research and Current Index to Statistics. Today, Cuban organizes and hosts a series of scientific events on operations research, under a broad definition of the term O.R. for establishing the themes covered by these scientific events. The 11th in the series cycle, which concluded in March of this year, included: conferences, where the open themes are optimization, operations research education, probability and statistics, partial differential equations, numerical analysis and algorithms; and workshops, where a theme is fixed and all contributions are oriented toward the theme. The theme of the 2015 workshop, “Operations Research and Human Welfare Health Environment and Education,” was devoted to the application of the models and methods of operations research in problems related to harmonic development of the human being and his environment. The aim was to promote the interchange on applications of operations research in medical investigation, biological modeling and social researches that are oriented toward improvement of human welfare. The workshop included a colloquium on teaching effectiveness organized by James Cochran of the University of Alabama, and featured INFORMS President Robin Keller and several other speakers from throughout Latin America and beyond. Cochran, cofounder of Statistics Without Borders, delivered the opening plenary. It is our hope that, in combination with the normalization of the relationship between Cuba and the United States, this conference will accelerate the rate of collaboration between colleagues from these two nations. https://www.informs.org/ORMSToday/PrivateArticles/AprilVolume42Number2/OperationsresearchinCuba

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Carlos N. Bouza Herrera and Sira Allende Alonso are professors at the Universidad de La Habana in Havana, Cuba. References

1. Bouza, C. N., 2004, “Enseñanza de las Matemáticas en Cuba,” www.fbisu.net.mx/bouza.html (http://www.fbisu.net.mx/bouza.html)

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. Last consulted Jan. 5, 2007. Beltran-Marin, A.L., 2012, “Bosquejo histórico sobre las Reformas Universitarias del siglo XX en Cuba,” Revista Cubana de Filosofía, http//revista.filosofia.cu/pensamientoc.php? id=630Published 01-01-2013, consulted January 2013. Cortés Cortés, Manuel E., and R. Miranda Pérez, 2007, “Modelación Multicriterio Aplicada Al Análisis De Inversiones, Revista Investigación Operacional,” Vol. 28, pp. 262-268. Cortés Cortés, Manuel E., and Anibal E. Borroto Nordelo, 2007, “Modelacion Multicriterial Y Medio Ambiente,” Revista Investigación Operacional, Vol. 28, pp. 92-97. Cortés Cortés, Manuel E., and Sánchez Navarro, 2008, “Modelo Lineal Multiobjetivo Para La Toma De Decisiones En Alimentacióndel Ganado,” Revista Investigación Operacional, Vol. 29, pp. 5-7. Garza Ríos, R., and C. González Sánchez, 2004a, “Drsoft Un Soporte Computacional Para El Diseño De Rutas De Distribución,” Investigación Operacional, Vol. 25, pp. 260 -259. Garza Ríos, R., and C. González Sánchez, 2004b, “Meroute Un Método Multiatributo Para El Ruteo De Vehículos,” Investigación Operacional, Vol. 25, pp. 270-277.


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8. López Milán, E., S. Miquel Fernández and Li. M. Plá Aragonés, 2004, “El Problema Del Transporte De La Caña De Azúcar En Cuba,” Investigación Operacional, Vol. 25, pp. 148-157. 9. Lopez Serrano, E, 2002, “Desarrollo histórico de las estadísticas sanitarias en Cuba,” Cuad Hist Salud Pública, Vol. 91, ene.-jun. 10. Marrero, L., 2005, “Cuba en la Década de 1950. Un país en desarrollo,” Carta de Cuba Inc, San Juan. 11. Núñez De Villavicencio Ferrer, M., 2002, “Optimización De Múltiples Respuestas Por El Método De La Función De Conveniencia Para Un Diseño De Mezclas,” Investigación Operacional, Vol. 23, pp. 83-89. 12. Pérez León, V., I. Camargo Toribio, R. Caballero Fernández and M. González Lozano, 2008, “Selección Multicriterio De Nuevos Productos Turísticos En Pinar Del Río, Cuba,” Investigación Operacional, Vol. 29, pp. 98107. 13. Salles Scarpari, M., Gomes Ferreira De Beauclair, E., 2010, “Optimized Agricultural Planning Of Sugarcane Using Linear Programming,” Investigación Operacional, Vol. 31, pp. 126-132. INFORMS • 5521 Research Park Drive, Suite 200 (On the campus of University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Hussman Building), Catonsville, MD 21228 USA phone: 443-757-3500 • 800-4INFORMS (800-446-3676) • fax: 443-757-3515 • email: [email protected]


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