Cuba's sugar ministry will close in the coming months and be replaced by a state-run corporation. It will be the latest chapter in the relentless decline of what was once the Caribbean island's flagship industry. Then leader, Fidel Castro, pictured in 1969, nationalized the industry in 1960. Cuba was once the world's biggest sugar exporter. In 1990, sugar accounted for 90 per cent exports, but the industry went into decline after Cuba's top ally for 30 years, the former Soviet Union, collapsed in 1991.