19 May 2011 will mark one hundred and fifty years of the founding of the Royal Academy of Medical, Physical and Natural Sciences of Havana, an institution that in our country is only preceded by the University of Havana, founded in 1728, and the Economic Society of Friends of the Country, founded in 1793. It also was the first Academy of Sciences based on merit which was founded outside Europe. The present decree-law that governs the institution, signed in 1996 by the Cuban leader Fidel Castro Ruz, acknowledged that this institution was the predecessor of the Academy of Sciences of Cuba as it exists today.

In turn, on February 20, 2012 we commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the revival of the Academy of Sciences of Cuba, in compliance with one of the first actions of the Cuban revolution, aimed at promoting research and science as factors of economic and social development of the Cuban nation.

In order to properly commemorate both anniversaries it is being organized in our capital a program of activities that includes not only the celebration of cultural activities, but also meetings of various international scientific bodies as the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Inter-American Network of Academies of Sciences (IANAS), the Global Network of Academies of Sciences (IAP) and the Caribbean Scientific Union (CCC), among other celebrations.

Through these activities we will not only disclose these events, but we also will put into context the origins of the Academy as one of the oldest institutions of the Cuban nation, its precedence in two years to the founding of the US National Academy of Sciences, its revival after the Revolution and its contribution to the development of a national scientific capacity, on the basis of those honorable precedents shaped by historical figures such as Carlos J. Finlay, Felipe Poey, Francisco de Albear, Alvaro Reynoso and many others, but above all, in the fulfillment of Fidel Castro’s vision and idea to build  a science that can be part of our whole society.