international trade deals that reinvigorated cigar exports in the following years. In 2016 Cuba exported $445 million worth of cigars worldwide, and in 2017, Cuba exported approximately a half billion dollars in cigars. This accounted for 27 percent of goods exports that year.

Due to the perceived status and higher price of Cuban cigars, and the difficulty of identifying the provenance of an unlabeled cigar, counterfeits are not unusual. Cuba counters this trend through a series of exercises in demonstrating authenticity, such as guarantee