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 government claim that 65% of Cubans were white.

According to the 2002 census, Cuba's population was 11,177,743. The population of Cuba was 11,241,161 people on December 31, 2010 and 11,163,934 in the 2012 census.

Evolution of Cuba's population

Census history
Year	Population
1774	171,600
1792	274,300
1817	572,363
1827	704,586
1833	730,000
1841	1,007,624
1861	1,396,530
1862	1,259,200
1877	1,509,291
1887	1,631,687
1899	1,572,797
1910	2,219,000
1920	2,997,000
1930	3,647,000
1950	5,516,000
1980	9,724,000
2000	11,142,000
2010	11,241,161
2012	11,163,934
First Census was in 1774. 1899 Census taken by the U.S.

Official 1775-1899 Cuba Census
White			Non-white
Census	Number	Percentage	Number	Percentage
1775	96,440	56.2	75,180	43.8
1792	153,559	56.4	118,741	43.6
1817	257,380	45.0	314,983	55.0
1827	311,051	44.2	393,435	55.8
1841	418,291	41.5	589,333	58.5
1861	793,484	56.8	603,046	43.2
1877	1,023,394	67.8	485,897	32.2
1887	1,102,889	67.6	528,798	32.4
1899	1,067,354	67.9	505,443	32.1
According to the Census, the Chinese were counted as white.

Religion

Main article: Religion in Cuba

Cuba has a multitude of faiths reflecting the island's diverse cultural elements. Catholicism, which was brought to the island by Spanish colonialists at the beginning of the 16th century, is the most prevalent professed faith. After the revolution, Cuba became an officially atheistic state and restricted religious practice. Since the Fourth Cuban Communist Party Congress in 1991, restrictions have been eased and, according to the National Catholic Observer, direct challenges by state institutions to the right to religion have all but disappeared, though the church still faces restrictions of written and electronic communication, and can only accept donations from state-approved funding sources. The Roman Catholic Church is made up of the Cuban Catholic Bishops' Conference (COCC), led by Jaime Lucas Ortega y Alamino, Cardinal Archbishop of Havana.^{[citation needed]} It has eleven dioceses, 56 orders of nuns and 24 orders of priests. In January 1998, Pope John Paul II paid a historic visit to the island, invited by the Cuban government and Catholic Church.

Afro-Cuban religions, a blend of native African religions and Roman Catholicism, are widely practiced in Cuba. This diversity derives from West and Central Africans who were transported to Cuba, and in effect reinvented their African religions. They did so by combining them with elements of the Catholic belief system, with a result very similar to Brazil

Protestantism, introduced from the United States in the 18th century, has seen a steady increase in popularity. 300,000 Cubans belong to the island's 54 Protestant denominations. Pentecostalism has grown rapidly in recent years, and the Assemblies of God alone claims a membership of over 100,000 people. The Episcopal Church of Cuba claims 10,000 adherents. Cuba has small communities of Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and members of the Bahá'í

Cuban ancestry

Main article: Spanish immigration to Cuba

The ancestry of Cubans comes from many sources:

• Spanish

During the 18th, 19th and early part of the 20th century, large waves of Spanish immigrants from Canary Islands, Catalonia, Andalusia, Galicia, and Asturias emigrated to Cuba. Between 1882 and 1898, a total of 508,455 people left Spain, and more than 750,000 Spanish immigrants left for Cuba between 1899 and 1923, with many returning to Spain.

• Canarian people
• Catalan people
• Andalusian people
• Galician people
• Asturian people

The Slave trade brought Africans to Cuba during its early history: Between 1842 and 1873, 221,000 African slaves entered Cuba.

• Africans
• Haitians.

Other European people that have contributed include:

• French
• Portuguese
• Italians
• Germans
• Russians

People from Asia:

• Chinese
• Filipino

Between 1842 and 1873, 124,800 Chinese arrived.

• Lebanese

There is also a small number of Jews living in Cuba.

Genetics

A 1995 study done on the population of Pinar del Rio, found that 50% of the Mt-DNA lineages (female lineages) could be traced back to Europeans, 46% to Africans and 4% to Native Americans. This figure is consistent with both the historical background of the region, and the current demographics of it.

Regarding Y-chromosome haplogroups (male lineages), 78.8% of the sequences found in Cubans are of West Eurasian origin, 19.7% of African origin and 1.5% of East Asian origin. Among the West Eurasian fraction, the vast majority of individuals belong to West European haplogroup R1b. The African lineages found in Cubans have a Western (haplogroups E1, E2, E1b1a ) and Northern (E1b1b-M81 ) African origin. The "Berber" haplogroup E1b1b1b (E-M81), is found at a frequency of 6.1%.

According to Fregel et al. (2009), the fact that autochthonous male North African E-M81 and female U6 lineages from the Canaries have been detected in Cuba and Iberoamerica, demonstrates that Canary Islanders with indigenous ancestors actively participated in the American colonization.

Origins of Cuban Spanish

See also: Cuban Spanish

Of all the regional variations of the Spanish language, traditional Cuban Spanish is most similar to, and originates largely from the Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands. Cuba owes much of their speech patterns to the Canarian migration, which in the 19th and early 20th century was heavy and continuous. There was also migrations of Galicians and Asturians as well, but they did not leave a mirror image on their accent on the Cuban accent like the Canarian people did. Much of the typical Cuban replacements for standard Spanish vocabulary stems from Canarian lexicon. For example, guagua (bus) differs from standard Spanish autobús the former originated in the Canaries and is an onomatopoeia stemming from the sound of a Klaxon horn (wah-wah!). An example of Canarian usage for a Spanish word is the verb fajarse ("to fight"). In standard Spanish the verb would be pelearse, while fajar exists as a non-reflexive verb related to the hemming of a skirt.

Demographic statistics from the Official 2002 Cuba Census

Life in Cuba
Art Cinema Cuisine Culture Demographics Education Health Holidays Human Rights Literature Music Politics Religion Tourism

Population	11,177,743
Age structure	0-14 years: 19.1% (male 1,117,677/female 1,058,512) 15-64 years: 70.3% (male 4,001,161/female 3,999,303) 65 years and over: 10.6% (male 554,148/female 652,019) (2006 est.)
Median age	Total: 39.5 years Male: 38.6 years Female: 40.3 years (2013 est.)
Population growth rate	-0.01% (2006 est.)
Birth rate	11.89 births/1,000 population (2006 est.)
Death rate	7.22 deaths/1,000 population (2006 est.)
Net migration rate
Sex ratio	At birth: 1.06 male(s)/female Under 15 years: 1.06 male(s)/female 15-64 years: 1 male(s)/female 65 years and over: 0.85 male(s)/female Total population: 0.99 male(s)/female (2006 est.)
Infant mortality rate	Total: 6.32 deaths/1,000 live births Male: 6.99 deaths/1,000 live births Female: 5.41 deaths/1,000 live births (2006 est.)
Life expectancy at birth	Total population: 77.41 years Male: 75.11 years Female: 79.85 years (2006 est.)
Total fertility rate	1.66 children born/woman (2006 est.)
HIV/AIDS	Adult prevalence rate: less than 0.1% (2003 est.) People living with HIV/AIDS: 3,300 (2003 est.) Deaths: less than 200 (2003 est.)
Racial groups	Whites: 65.05% Mulattoes: 23.84% Blacks: 10.08% Asians: 1.02%
Religions	Nominally 85% Roman Catholic prior to the Revolution; Protestants, Jehovah's Witnesses, Muslims, Jews, and Santeria are also represented.
Languages	Spanish English Haitian Creole
Literacy	Total population: 99.8% (2002 census) Male: 99.8% Female: 99.8% Definition: age 15 and over can read and write

Illicit migration is a continuing problem. Cubans require Cuban government documentation to leave, and this is commonly refused. Cubans attempt to depart the island and enter the US using homemade rafts, alien smugglers, direct flights, or falsified visas; Cubans also use non-maritime routes to enter the US including direct flights to Miami and overland via the southwest US/Mexican border, and islands adjacent to Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.

Cuban census 2002

The 2002 census is the most recent official census of Cuba (as of 2011).

Population by region

Population and Area by region
Province	Area (km²)	Area (%)	Population	Population (%)	Density
Cuba Total	109,886.19	100	11,177,743	100	101.72
Pinar del Río	10,904.03	9.92	726,574	6.50	66.63
La Habana	5,791.59	5.22	711,066	6.36	124.06
Ciudad de la Habana	721.01	0.66	2,201,610	19.70	3053.49
Matanzas	11,802.72	10.74	670,427	6.00	56.80
Villa Clara	8,412.41	7.06	817,395	7.31	97.17
Cienfuegos	4,180.02	3.80	395,183	3.54	94.54
Sancti Spíritus	6,736.51	6.13	460,328	4.12	68.33
Ciego de Ávila	6,783.13	6.17	411,766	3.68	60.70
Camagüey	15,615.02	14.21	784,178	7.02	50.22
Las Tunas	6,587.75	6.00	525,485	4.70	79.77
Holguín	9,292.83	8.46	1,021,321	9.14	109.90
Granma	8,375.49	7.62	822,452	7.36	98,20
Santiago de Cuba	6,156.44	5.60	1,036,281	9.27	168.32
Guantánamo	6,167.97	5.61	507,118	4.54	82.22
Isla de la Juventud	2,419.27	2.20	86,559	0.77	35.78

See also

• Cuban American
• Spanish people
• Canarian people
• Catalan people
• Chinese Cuban
• Afro-Cuban
• Isleños
• Jewish Cuban
• Women in Cuba
• Ranked list of Cuban provinces

References

 This article incorporates public domain material from the CIA World Factbook document "2006 edition".

• Statoids (July 2003). "Municipios of Cuba". Retrieved 2007-02-15. 
• Matanzas Portal (2004). "Population gowth by municipality and province". Archived from the original on 2007-02-15. Retrieved 2007-02-21. 
• The Peninsular (May 2007). Population, birth rate falling in Cuba: Official

External links

• Cuba statistics and related publications