Hours over rutted roads inland from Havana, the small Cuban city of Jatibonico is a snapshot of late 19th-century living, its streets crowded with horse-drawn carriages and lacking power much of the day and night.

The town’s decrepit sugar mill — once the country's largest — sits idle, lacking the parts, electricity and fuel it needs to operate.

Two years ago a Russian company, Progress Agro, announced it would import machinery, fertilizer, and know-how to revitalize the mill, which once employed 2,000 people.