Posted on 02/01/2002 12:41:31 PM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
CANCUN, Mexico (Reuters) - Cuba says it will not import any more U.S. agricultural products until Washington's embargo against the island is eased further, but modest ``gestures'' like easing credit restrictions might stimulate more trade.
Trade Minister Raul de la Nuez said December's purchase of more than $30 million of U.S. meat and grains -- the first such shipment in almost 40 years -- demonstrated that commerce between the two nations benefits U.S. agricultural producers as much as Cuba.
He said Cuba wanted to quickly develop greater trade with the United States but would not make new import orders unless the terms of the embargo are eased.
``As we are now, it is impossible to keep doing business,'' de la Nuez told Reuters late on Thursday in Mexico's Caribbean resort of Cancun, where Cuban government officials met with U.S. producers at a trade conference aimed at building closer ties.
The U.S. Congress last year approved legislation allowing cash sales of food and medicine to Cuba. Although President Fidel Castro at first refused to make any purchases, he changed tack when the United States offered Cuba humanitarian aid after Hurricane Michelle swept across the island in early November, causing widespread damage.
Castro politely turned down the aid offer but thanked Washington for its ``kind'' gesture and said his government would buy the food instead.
The breakthrough deliveries have raised hopes among U.S. agricultural producers that they can gain a firm foothold in a $1 billion a year market they have been excluded from for four decades.
De la Nuez said if Congress or the U.S. government would further soften the embargo, Cuba would import more U.S. goods.
``The ideal would be that the embargo is canceled and bilateral trade allowed. That is what we want. But we know that will take some time and this has to be done step by step.''
TRAVEL BAN, CREDIT ACCESS
He said Cuba would see as positive any new measures easing the ban on U.S. citizens traveling to Cuba or allowing U.S. firms or banks to offer Cuba credit for its imports because Cuba currently has to pay for any imports in cash or win credit from a third country.
U.S. legislators who back ending the embargo hope to make more advances this year, perhaps by making amendments to a farm bill currently before the Senate that would drop the restrictions on private sector credit facilities.
Pedro Alvarez, head of Cuba's state-owned food import agency Alimport, which made the recent purchases, said further trade advances might require only that Washington speed up the process of handing out export licenses for exporters selling agricultural products to Cuba.
``We need official guarantees or that it works that way in practice,'' he said. ``With these types of gestures, we hope we could respond with a new purchase.''
Without concessions from Washington, however, de la Nuez said Cuba had too much to lose by importing from the United States because U.S. suppliers need special export licenses that are often slow to come through.
``We can't abandon our traditional suppliers, the ones that gave us credit lines and contracts that work, to buy from U.S. suppliers who can't send their ship if they don't get a license and where trade can be shut off whenever the president feels like it. It would be very risky, especially with foods.''
INVESTMENTS IN CUBA-- The more things change in Cuba, the more it remains the same. To dispel any doubts about it, Fidel Castro has made it very clear that he is not contemplating any meaningful economic or political change in Cuba for the next one hundred years. When CNN's Bernard Shaw interviewed the Cuban tyrant on October 22, 1995 he asked if he would retire in order to facilitate an economic recovery in Cuba, but he was adamant- he would not. When he questioned if he would allow another political party in Cuba, the dictator for life responded - not in one year, not in ten years, not even in 100 years. A Hitler's fan, Castro is more modest, he is foreseen only 100 years forward not 1,000 as his German homologue. Evidently Castro thinks he will break the record of Methuselah!
Food, drug industries size up Cuba market-- While hopes for a trade thaw are high among Cuban officials and U.S. firms, one expert warned against excessive optimism. Most U.S.-Cuba trade is barred by the embargo, and it was only after a November hurricane that Cuba got to buy its first U.S. food since the embargo began.
(See what Ms. Cowal is all about)-- Castro puts on friendly face for U.S.-Launches "charm" offensive--Until I went to Cuba this last time, I was always ambivalent about whether the Cubans really welcomed any change" in American policy, said Sally Grooms Cowal, head of the reform-minded Cuba Policy Foundation, which led a U.S. congressional delegation to the island earlier this month.
All Marxists and intellectual midgets say that.
Castro is laughing is @$$ off at us because the Global Corporate Taliban are sneaking his sugar across our borders for him. Life Savers takes business to Canada over sugar costs
She was too busy sharing off color jokes with Castro to ask to visit the women's prison.
Maybe it was all that sunshine, they don't get much of that up in Washington state.
He's also laughing, 'cause lyin' george ryan, gov. of IL just came back from their after working on some deals.
You're right.
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