Slavery[edit]Between 1511 and 1886

Slavery[edit]
Between 1511 and 1886 over one million African slaves were taken to Cuba. The use of slavery for the production and selling of sugar was established prior, but the cultivation of coffee required its own partition of slave labor. Its cultivation has been connected to the slave trade, slave labor, and harsh conditions on Cuban plantations.[67]

Coffee entered the Caribbean in the early eighteenth century. When coffee first reached Cuba, farmers welcomed it due to minimal land and machinery requirements for its cultivation. Slaveholding increased with the expansion of coffee production.,[68] but the practice was enforced by prison-like conditions that created unrest and inevitable rebellions against the wealthy plantation owners. Coffee production in Cuba did not last as long as in other countries due to the competition with Brazilian coffee.[69]

Coffee is mostly grown in the developing world. Coffee cultivation has been accused of contributing to child labour.[70]