Purchases from U.S. suggest hurricane relief needed urgently

 BY NANCY SAN MARTIN

 The amount of food the Cuban government has agreed to purchase in groundbreaking deals with U.S. vendors -- in addition to the large quantity of medicine it wants to buy -- suggests that the island was more severely battered by Hurricane Michelle than it has publicly acknowledged.

 The government has not yet provided a detailed accounting of the damage, but in rice alone, Cuba is purchasing enough of the long grain to feed the entire population for at least a couple of weeks, or the residents of the hardest hit regions for several months, experts say.

 Bids also are under way to replenish hospital supplies to treat everything from yeast infections to asthma and even stock up on chemotherapy agents for cancer patients.

 For U.S. farmers and wood and medical suppliers scrambling for contracts, the deals reached since mid-November have raised hopes that as much as $30 million worth of sales are in the offing, and that this won't be a one-time endeavor.

 EXCITEMENT BUILDING

 The delivery of the products will begin as U.S. business leaders prepare to meet with high-level Cuban officials at a conference in Cancún, Mexico, in January to discuss trade relations.

 "The phone has been ringing off the hook,'' said Paul Golden, who is organizing the conference in Cancún, scheduled for Jan. 30 to Feb. 2. ``Everybody wants to know if this is a good time to start networking with the Cubans. It's not really clear whether this is strictly a one-time buy or if both sides are taking steps, but everybody has a sense that we're building momentum for change.''

 But even as Cubans and Americans shake hands over signed contracts, the bickering continues between the Cuban government and U.S. antagonists. Last week,
 President Fidel Castro led an anti-U.S. rally of about 300,000 people in Havana to protest U.S. policy, and Cuba remains on the State Department's list of countries that support terrorist activities.

 AN OPENING IN TRADE?

 ``This is a tug of war between moderates who want an opening [in trade] and hard-liners both in Cuba and here,'' said Uva de Aragón, assistant director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University. ``I don't think they are going to get very far. I don't see anything there that is going to make a big difference or have a big impact, but this [sale agreement] is certainly something to watch.''

 Kirby Jones, a consultant for firms interested in doing business with Cuba, said the deals reached so far are just the beginning. He was in Havana last week to set up
 additional chicken contracts and is searching for firms that can supply medical needs.

 ``Regardless of the circumstances of why, this is an extraordinary event,'' Jones said. ``It is an exceptional exception. The door is now open. It's like toothpaste in a tube -- once it's out, it's hard to get it back in.''

 MIGRATION ISSUE

 Meanwhile, the political climate is sure to heat up again as U.S. and Cuban officials sit down for another round of migration talks Monday.

 Despite the continued animosity between the Cuban government and its opponents on this side of the Florida Straits, the need for hurricane relief is rekindling interest in trading with a country that was a strong market for U.S. goods before Castro came to power in 1959.

 The contracts signed so far are set to use the ports of Houston and New Orleans for shipping. Cuba relied heavily on Texas and Louisiana to import rice after World War II.

 Cuba has already signed a contract for 20,000 metric tons of long-grain white rice. That is significant, considering that Cuba imports about 80 percent of the 600,000 metric tons of rice it consumes each year, said Eric Wailes, an agricultural economist at the University of Arkansas, who has done studies on Cuba as a potential market for rice.

 Cuba has been relying on Vietnam, China and Thailand for its rice. The 400,000 metric tons of rice it imports from these countries is about equal to 20 percent of total U.S. rice exports.

 ``For the U.S. to get rice in there represents a major breakthrough for the rice industry,'' Wailes said. ``The U.S. can be a major competitor. Cuba would become, almost immediately, one of the major markets. U.S. rice industries should be very excited about this opportunity.''

 In addition to rice, other purchases already agreed to by Cuba include an unspecified amount of wood products and more than 115,500 metric tons of chicken, wheat flour, yellow corn animal feed, powdered milk, soybeans, cooking oil, soybean oil and hard red winter wheat, according to the New York-based U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council.

 The supplies are scheduled to begin arriving as early as the middle of this month, and contracts with at least four companies stretch through February.

 MEDICAL PRODUCTS

 In addition, Cuba is seeking out U.S. companies to purchase millions of units of medical products to replenish inventories depleted as a result of Hurricane Michelle. The products vary from dextrose, used to boost sugar levels, to cyclophosphamide, a chemotherapeutic agent.

 ``It sounds like stock is low or this stuff is wiped out,'' said Jeffrey Bernstein, medical director of the Poison Information Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital.

 ``This is all very typical stuff all hospitals would use. They're clearly stocking a hospital, not a clinic, and probably a pretty big hospital or several hospitals.''