Virginia businesses go courting in Cuba
HAVANA: It was a blind date of sorts, this first meeting between the Cubans and the Virginians who had come wooing with high-tech fish farms and fancy wood f looring, organic chicken and bony, downscale fish.
The icebreaker, proffered by Cuba’s Ministry of Foreign Trade and Investment, was a slide show meant to stress the safety of pouring big bucks into the communist island nation.
Foreign investments “enjoy all-out protection and legal security and could not be expropriated, unless such action is executed for reasons of public or social interest,” one slide read.
Members of Virginia’s business delegation, most of them visiting Cuba for the first time, barely stif led a collective “Yikes!”
“I gotta know I’m not going to invest half a million in a mill down here and lose it,” Bill Stone, owner of Mountain Lumber Co., said later.
After a half-century of hostilities and 13 months of detente, US-Cuban business relations are at a moment of tantalising promise and stomach-churning doubt. Stone, like others on the three-day trade mission that Governor Terry McAuliffe led last week, came away from the encounter keenly interested though not entirely smitten. With the winds of history seemingly at their backs – and a well-connected governor in their corner – they returned to Virginia intent on pushing ahead, however warily, with their Cuban courtship.
They face legal and political obstacles on both sides of the Florida Straits, with especially byzantine do’s and don’ts in evolving – but still centrally controlled - Cuba. In many cases, there was no simple answer to even the most basic question: Can I legally sell my product or service to Cuba?
Yet at least so far, those who made the trip returned undaunted, willing to wade into bureaucracies foreign and domestic, to face unknowns and red tape. They felt certain that doors would be opened for them by McAuliffe, who met with the White House and congressional leaders the day after his return, then headed to Iowa to stump for a long-time friend, presidential contender Hillary Clinton. They were also convinced that Cuba will eventually shake off its economic shackles - and pay off for those who get in early.
“It’s obviously going to take off. and the question is whether we are going to have a part of that,” said Stone, who sells wood reclaimed from old barns to Starbucks and others seeking a warm, weathered vibe in their business interiors - something desirable, he thinks, for future Cuban resorts. “There’s a win- win if we can get the politics straight.”
The rules for commercial engagement between Cuba and the United States are complex and quickly changing. What Washington allows does not always line up with what Havana permits, and vice versa. — WP-Bloomberg
I gotta know I’m not going to invest half a million in a mill down here and lose it.
Bill Stone, owner of Mountain Lumber Co.