LETTER FROM THE CARIBBEAN

The announcement was greeted with the same enthusiasm on several islands and countries around the Caribbean Sea: On December 4, cassava, the humble indigenous manioc pancake made throughout the region, was inscribed on the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's (UNESCO) World Heritage List. In 2022, five countries in the Caribbean basin submitted a joint application for UNESCO's recognition of the "Traditional knowledge and practices for the making and consumption of cassava bread": Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Venezuela and Honduras.

In these countries, "cassava bread is a key part of daily diets and provides a connection with the communities' Indigenous and African heritage," the UN institution said in the brief statement announcing its decision. This ancestral food "promotes tolerance and unity, as each community values its own cassava bread making while recognizing the practices of other communities and groups," UNESCO added.

This recognition honors "the age-old tradition that has been perpetuated in several Caribbean nations," hailed Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla. The preparation of the unleavened pancake "draws on ancestral knowledge that has withstood centuries of colonization," praised Ernesto Villegas, the Venezuelan minister of culture. In a press release, his Haitian counterpart, Patrick Delatour, said he saw in the inscription "another reason for hope" in his country gripped by a deep political and security crisis, calling for "strengthening social cohesion to achieve economic development" in Haiti.

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