From Rainforest to Cane Field in Cuba: An Environmental History since 1492 (Envisioning Cuba) (Envisioning Cuba (Paperback))

In this award-winning environmental history of Cuba since the age of Columbus, Reinaldo Funes Monzote emphasizes the two processes that have had the most dramatic impact on the island's landscape: deforestation and sugar cultivation. During the first 300 years of Spanish settlement, sugar plantations arose primarily in areas where forests had been cleared by the royal navy, which maintained an interest in management and conservation for the shipbuilding industry. The sugar planters won a decisive victory in 1815, however, when they were allowed to clear extensive forests, without restriction, for cane fields and sugar production. This book is the first to consider Cuba's vital sugar industry through the lens of environmental history. Funes Monzote demonstrates how the industry that came to define Cuba—and upon which Cuba urgently depended—also devastated the ecology of the island. The original Spanish-language edition of the book, published in Mexico in 2004, was awarded the UNESCO Book Prize for Caribbean Thought, Environmental Category. For this first English edition, the author has revised the text throughout and provided new material, including a glossary and a conclusion that summarizes important developments up to the present. Contents 8 Preface 14 Introduction 20 1 The Omnipresent Forest and the Beginnings of the Sugar Industry 26 2 Shipbuilding and the Sugar Industry, 1772–1791 58 3 The Struggle over Private Ownership of Forests, 1792–1815 102 4 Sugar and the Absolute Freedom to Clear Forests, 1815–1876 146 5 Centralization of the Sugar Industry and the Forests, 1876–1898 198 6 North American Capital and Sugar’s Final Assault on the Forest, 1898–1926 236 Conclusion: From Forests to Sugar: An Insignificant Change? 282 Appendix 1. Scientific Names of Plants and Animals 296 Appendix 2. Temperature and Precipitation in the Natural Regions of Cuba 300 Appendix 3. Units of Measure, with Equivalents 302 Notes 304 Glossary 348 Bibliographic Essay 352 Index 362