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Presentan informe nacional del Censo de Población y Vivienda
Granma, 11/12/05


en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Cuba

This article is about the demographic features of the population of Cuba, including population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.The 2002 census figures supplied by the regime claim that 65% of Cubans were white.

 The Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami says 68% are black.The Minority Rights Group International says that "An objective assessment of the situation of Afro-Cubans remains problematic due to scant records and a paucity of systematic studies both pre- and post-revolution. Estimates of the percentage of people of African descent in the Cuban population vary enormously, ranging from 33.9 per cent to 62 per cent". It uses the number for 51% for mulattoes.

According to the 2002 census, Cuba's population was 11,177,743.

www.miamiherald.com/multimedia/news/afrolatin/part4/index.html

Cuba's official statistics offer little help on the race issue. The 2002 census, which asked Cubans whether they were white, black or mestizo/mulatto, showed 11 percent of the island's 11.2 million people described themselves as black. The real figure is more like 62 percent, according to the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami.

And the published Census figures provide no way at all to compare blacks and whites in categories like salary or educational levels. Ramón Colás, who left Cuba in 2001 and now runs an Afro-Cuba race-relations project in Mississippi, said he once carried out his own telling survey: Five out of every 100 private vehicles he counted in Havana were driven by a Cuban of color.

The disparity between the census' 11 percent and UM's 62 percent also reflects the complicated racial categories in a country where if you look white you are considered white, no matter the genes.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/print/cu.html

CIA happily adopts the 2002 Cuban Census results with no commentary.

World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Cuba : Afro-Cubans, 2008, UNHCR

Since 1989 and the so-called 'special period in peacetime', statistics and analysis concerning social trends in Cuba have been almost unavailable. This compounds a more long-standing problem of information concerning race relations and minorities in the island. An objective assessment of the situation of Afro-Cubans remains problematic due to scant records and a paucity of systematic studies both pre- and post-revolution.

Estimates of the percentage of people of African descent in the Cuban population vary enormously, ranging from 33.9 per cent to 62 per cent. This is partly a question of self-perception, as census figures are based on how Cubans define themselves.

As in many Latin American and Caribbean countries, there is also a large 'mulatto' or ethnically mixed population, and colour, class and social status are closely interlinked. Few Cubans are either 'pure' white or black. Definitions of 'colour' are as much the result of social criteria as of somatic classification. Afro-Cubans are most prevalent in the eastern part of the island and in districts of Havana.

Taking all of this into consideration, the fact that there has been a significant exodus of 'white' Cubans from the island means that Afro-Cubans have now come to represent a larger proportion of the overall population and are now thought to constitute closer to 70 per cent of the total.

Reflections On Race & The Status Of People Of African Descent In Revolutionary Cuba, Eugene Godfried, 11/2000

Some official documents consider a "mulatto" as being "white". Other documents define Chinese as "white" and yet on other occasions as "black." One can find still other sources, such as the Ministry of External Affairs, that include black and mulattos on the same side of the list resulting in a 63% figure for the segment of African descent, an estimate one also finds in American sources, both governmental and scholarly.

Percentages that are sometimes officially applied, such as whites 70%, blacks 19 %, mulattos 11%, are clearly inadequate. These likely come from the 1980-1981 census, where people were asked to identify themselves along ethnic lines, and are disregarded by most Cuba scholars. Such percentages necessarily lead to partial policies followed by inequality in proportional social relations as a result. Consequently, leading figures directing major policy-making bodies need to accommodate themselves on these patterns of visions and in order to be inspired to have a critical and self-critical attitude when addressing themes regarding the position, participation, and mobility of the people of African descent in the Cuban society.

From http://popindex.princeton.edu/browse/v53/n1/s.html

53:10853 Cuba. Comite Estatal de Estadisticas (Havana, Cuba). Census of population and housing of 1981: methodological volume, Vol. 17. [Censo de poblacion y viviendas de 1981: tomo metodologico, Volumen XVII.] Jul 1984. [206] pp. Havana, Cuba. In Spa.
This volume describes the methodology used in the 1981 census of Cuba. Information is also provided on scheduled publications of census results and costs. Comparisons are made with other Cuban censuses.
Location: University of Texas at Austin, Population Research Center. Source: APLIC Census Network List, No. 68, Dec 1986.

The Cuban-American counterpoint: Black Cubans in the United States, Dialectical Anthropology, Sep 1988

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