The 'Campesino a Campesino' Agroecology Movement in Cuba

Agroecology has played a key role in helping Cuba survive the acute crisis caused by the collapse of the socialist bloc in Europe in 1989-90 and the subsequent chronic crisis due the U.S. trade embargo, which have prevented economic normalization on the island ever since socialist trade relations were lost. Cuban peasants have been able to boost food production without scarce and expensive imported agricultural chemicals by first substituting more ecological inputs for the no longer available imports and then by making a transition to more agroecologically integrated and diverse farming systems.