A glossary for reading Cuba.

A self-employed worker operating under a licensed activity list.

Cuentapropismo — self-employment — was reopened in 1993 and substantially expanded in 2010. Cuentapropistas operate as individuals on the basis of a list of permitted activities published by the government. Many of today's MIPYMES were originally registered as cuentapropistas before incorporating as companies in 2021–2024.

The 2011 decree that legalised the purchase and sale of housing between private individuals.

Decree-Law 288, published in the Gaceta Oficial on 2 November 2011, amended the General Housing Law to allow the sale, donation and exchange of homes between Cuban citizens and permanent residents. It is the legal foundation of the current Cuban housing market.

A joint venture between a foreign investor and a Cuban state enterprise.

Until the 2026 reforms, the empresa mixta was the standard form of foreign investment in Cuba — typically a Cuban state partner contributing land, premises or licences, and a foreign partner contributing capital and operational expertise. Equity, governance and dividend repatriation were defined contract by contract under Law 118.

The official journal in which Cuban laws, decrees and regulations are published.

All laws, decree-laws, decrees and ministerial resolutions take effect on publication in the Gaceta Oficial. For anyone tracking the implementation of a reform package, the relevant question is not the announcement but the date and number of the corresponding Gaceta issue.

The commercial enterprise of the Oficina del Historiador that funds restoration in Old Havana.

A state enterprise created in 1994 under the OHCH umbrella, Habaguanex operates hotels, restaurants, cafés and shops in Habana Vieja. Its profits are by statute reinvested into the restoration programme and the social fabric of the historic centre — schools, clinics, housing for residents displaced by works.

The historic centre of Havana, inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1982.

Habana Vieja covers roughly 2.14 km² inside the line of the old city walls. Inscribed by UNESCO in 1982 together with its system of fortifications, it preserves one of the most complete colonial urban ensembles in the Americas, organised around four founding squares laid down between the late sixteenth and eighteenth centuries.

The 2014 foreign investment law that framed how foreign capital enters Cuba.

Approved by the National Assembly on 29 March 2014, Law No. 118 replaced the earlier Law 77 of 1995. It set out three permitted vehicles — joint ventures, international economic association contracts, and wholly foreign-owned enterprises — and the tax incentives attached to each. Until June 2026 the joint venture with a state enterprise was, in practice, the dominant route. The 2026 reform package widens access to the wholly foreign-owned form.

The eight-kilometre seawall and esplanade along Havana's northern coast.

Construction of the Malecón began in 1901 and continued in phases through the 1950s. The wall runs from the entrance of the bay, at the foot of Habana Vieja, west along Centro Habana and Vedado to the mouth of the Almendares river. It is at once a sea defence, a public promenade and the urban edge that defines Havana's relationship with the Florida Straits.

Micro, small and medium enterprises — formally recognised in Cuba since 2021.

Decree-Law 46 of August 2021 created the legal category of micro, small and medium enterprises (MIPYMES), allowing private individuals to incorporate companies for the first time in decades. As of 2024 more than ten thousand MIPYMES were registered. The 2026 reform package extends the framework upward, authorising larger private companies.

The hard-currency settlement mechanism used in a parallel retail network.

Introduced in 2019 and extended in 2020, the MLC system allows purchases in a designated network of stores using hard-currency-denominated cards loaded by bank transfer from abroad or by deposit of foreign banknotes. It operates alongside the CUP rather than replacing it.

The state body responsible for the restoration and management of Habana Vieja.

Founded in 1938 and headed for decades by the late Eusebio Leal Spengler, the OHCH was given expanded powers in 1993 to plan, finance and execute the restoration of the historic centre. Its operational arm, Habaguanex, reinvests revenues from hotels, restaurants and shops in the historic centre back into restoration and social programmes for residents.

The traditional Cuban housing swap — the legal predecessor of property sale.

For most of the post-1959 period, the legal mechanism for changing residence was the permuta — a swap of dwellings, sometimes with cash compensation tolerated unofficially. Direct purchase and sale of housing between private individuals was legalised in November 2011 by Decree-Law 288, opening a formal private housing market for the first time in five decades.

The Cuban peso — the country's sole official currency since 2021.

On 1 January 2021 the Cuban authorities implemented the Tarea Ordenamiento, ending the dual-currency system that had circulated the convertible peso (CUC) alongside the CUP since 1994. The CUC was withdrawn during 2021. The CUP is today the only official currency, though hard-currency stores (MLC) operate in parallel.

Havana's planned nineteenth-century district, west of Centro Habana.

Planned from 1859 on an orthogonal grid with mandatory front gardens and street trees, Vedado became Havana's twentieth-century downtown. It concentrates much of the city's mid-century modernist architecture — the Edificio FOCSA (1956), the Hotel Habana Libre (1958) — alongside the Universidad de La Habana and the Plaza de la Revolución.

Cuba's special development zone west of Havana, opened around the deep-water port of Mariel.

Created by Decree-Law 313 of 2013, ZED Mariel covers roughly 465 km² along the bay of Mariel, about 45 km west of Havana. It offers a distinct tax and customs regime, longer tax holidays than the general Law 118 framework, and is anchored by a deep-water container terminal able to receive post-Panamax vessels. Sectors prioritised include logistics, biotechnology, light manufacturing and agro-industry.