A little more than 11 years have passed since the approval of Law 113 “On the Tax System” which establishes in its article 175 the tax for the idleness of agricultural and forest lands.
The tax rate covers a range of 45 thousand to 180 thousand Cuban pesos per hectare, depending on the category of the land, and must be applied to the natural and legal persons who own them, regardless of whether they are their property. or state.
In Law 130 “On the State Budget for the year 2020”, of December 20, 2019, in its Article 102, the application of this tax was established during the year 2020 in the provinces of Pinar del Río, Artemisa, Mayabeque, Matanzas and Cienfuegos, based on the Balance of Land Use and Tenure corresponding to the year 2018, prepared by the Ministry of Agriculture.
A resolution of the Ministry of Finance and Prices indicated at that time that the municipal delegates of Agriculture must notify the Certificate of Exploitation of the land to the subjects referred to in its First section… In short, there is clarity of what each person must do. But as is the case with many pieces of legislation, I have not yet heard of the first owner or usufructuary of idle land who has had to pay a peso for not having put it into exploitation. And you only have to travel along roads and embankments to see marabou and weeds on both sides, although each hectare of land has names and surnames.
Everyone who owns land, including those who own it privately, as well as legal entities such as the CPA and UBPC, has the obligation to exploit it. I believe that if the tax on idle lands had been applied with the rigor that we need, a few people would have raised their hands a long time ago and would already be in the hands of people with the will to put them into production. I know excellent producers who have requested surrounding lands that have been idle in CPA’s possession for years and remain uncultivated. The legislation in force establishes that it is in the municipality where these problems are resolved, which avoids cumbersome and unnecessary procedures. It is also there where there must be the maximum interest in exploiting the land and ensuring food for the people. It is unacceptable to continue with idle lands for not enforcing the law. “Empty land does not give food,” the beloved scientist Sergio Rodríguez Morales used to reiterate, who died last Sunday and we have the duty to honor his memory with concrete actions.
Source: CMHW
