Experience Stern | Global

NYU Stern’s new course, “Cuba: Sanctions, Reform, Opportunities,” was offered for the first time in March 2014. Led by Professors Robert Roach and Susheela Raghavan, and with support from Stern’s Association of Hispanic and Black Business Students (AHBBS), the course provided MBA students with a firsthand look at the challenges of doing business in Cuba as well as potential opportunities arising from ongoing Cuban economic and political reform and changing US-Cuba relations. The program included lectures by Cuban professors, field trips and talks by Cuban economists, subject matter experts, industry leaders and political officials. Students explored a number of topics including Cuban history, Cuban peoples and culture, US trade and economic sanctions, Cuban regulation of foreign
 investment and business activities, the Cuban economy and economic reforms, and US business activities permitted with Cuba under current US trade sanctions including Cuban art, photography, music and cinema, licensed travel, food and agricultural products, medical supplies and telecommunication activities.


"Before this trip, Cuba was a country known to me only through high school history classes and the media," said MBA student Erica Rose. "Visiting it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to explore and learn about a country stuck in time, trying to find a way forward in a modern, global economy. Even with its limitations, Cuba has an innovative and developing business environment that we would not have been able to experience otherwise."