Cuba's National Reforestation Programme — Plan Turquino-Manati & State Forest Service

Cuba's state reforestation effort dates to the 1959 Ley de Repoblacion Forestal, which also created Sierra Maestra and other national parks. It was institutionalised through INDAF and, from 1998, through Law No. 85 (Ley Forestal), which created the Servicio Estatal Forestal (SEF) under the Ministry of Agriculture (MINAG) to approve and oversee reforestation projects nationwide. Delivery on the ground runs through provincial and municipal reforestation commissions under the National Commission of the Plan Turquino (est. 1987, later Plan Turquino-Manati), which targets mountain zones and lowland rural zones respectively, giving mountain cooperatives land usufruct and support to combine coffee, cacao or livestock work with reforestation duties.

National forest cover rose from roughly 14% in 1959 to 27.55% in 2010 and 31.23% in 2020 (World Bank/FAOSTAT, based on government-submitted data); Cuban outlets cite 30.6% for 2015. Extractive companies face a mandatory two-year post-clearing replanting rule. Pinar del Rio, the most forested province, reports around 47% cover.

The figures should be read with care: they derive from ONEI/MINAG reporting relayed largely unverified by state media, and historical data is internally inconsistent (a 1989 official figure of 23.7% versus a 1992 COMARNA figure of 18.2%, reflecting differing forest definitions). Early plantations relied heavily on non-native Eucalyptus (92% of 1960s plantings) and coastal Casuarina, both later recognised as ecologically poor choices, and seedling mortality is independently estimated at 47-73% against an official figure of around 40%.

The post-2020 economic crisis has visibly slowed the programme: hectares planted fell from 12,615.9 ha (2020) to 8,191.7 ha (2024), seedling production dropped by around 40% (24.77 million to 14.75 million), and firebreak maintenance fell from 802.1 km (2023) to 520.7 km (2024). Of 19,954.8 ha 'promoted' for restoration in 2024, only 3,750.3 ha were actually completed, while 136 wildfires burned over 813 ha in Pinar del Rio and other provinces in the first quarter of 2025 alone, pointing to rising fire pressure that the programme has not yet reversed.

Read the full analysis: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.FRST.ZS?locations=CU