SECTION: Section A; Page 8; Column 1; Foreign Desk 

LENGTH: 600 words

HEADLINE: Four U.S. Companies Sign the First Trade Deals With Cuba

BYLINE:  Reuters 

DATELINE: HAVANA, Nov. 21

BODY:
Four American companies became the first in four decades to sign trade accords with Cuba and will supply food worth about $20 million to aid in the recovery from Hurricane Michelle, a business official said today.

Representatives of the companies -- Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill, Riceland Foods and ConAgra -- were in Havana this week to sign the agreements with the state company Alimport to provide wheat, corn, soy and rice, said John Kavulich, president of the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council. The deals came after Cuba, which has been subject to a United States embargo since soon after President Fidel Castro's revolution in 1959, appealed to Washington to speed up authorization to buy food and medicines from the United States on a one-time basis to replenish stocks used after the hurricane hit on Nov. 4.

The storm, the worst in five decades, severely damaged crops earmarked for both export and local needs.

Washington had first offered to send humanitarian aid via nongovernment bodies, but Havana replied with a polite refusal and a counteroffer to buy food and medicines with cash.

Archer Daniels Midland signed the first of its contracts on Tuesday, for about 20,000 metric tons of wheat at a market value of around $2.5 million, Mr. Kavulich said.

Cuba is estimated to want products totaling about $30 million, of which Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill and Riceland appear to have won the largest share.

There was no immediate confirmation from Cuban officials on the deals, which still require approval by the United States Commerce Department.

But Cargill's director of international business development, Van Yeutter, confirmed his company's agreement to sell 20,000 metric tons of wheat, 19,000 tons of corn and 5,000 tons of crude vegetable oil for shipment in January and February.

A spokesman for Archer Daniels Midland, Larry Cunningham, confirmed the company had sold Cuba "tens of thousands" of tons of food products for shipment in the next week to 10 days. The products are expected to be transported on American ships or those of a third country.

Mr. Kavulich said another three companies, Gold Kist of Georgie, Tyson Foods in Arkansas and Perdue Farms in Maryland, were likely to win some remaining Cuban contracts.

Havana has stressed that the sales are exceptional because of the hurricane damage, and has reiterated its appeal for a full lifting of the embargo.

"The contracts being signed with Cuba should not be seen as as a start of an ongoing commercial relationship with Cuba," Mr. Kavulich said. "They are taking place under a humanitarian umbrella after Hurricane Michelle as the Cubans have made clear they don't expect to continue with these purchases."

But the contracts may be an important crack in the embargo, which is opposed by a significant farm and business lobby in the United States.

"The hurricane seems to have broken the logjam," said Phil Peters, vice president of the Washington-based Lexington Institute and a former State Department official who has traveled extensively in Cuba.

The situation has not only brought a symbolic sale to Cuba but has helped reinforce both sides' positions on the embargo.

Washington can demonstrate what it has long been arguing -- that sales of food and medicine are in fact possible thanks to modifications of the embargo legislation, if there is a political will in Cuba.

Havana has an opportunity to open a chink in the sanctions, stoke the internal American anti-embargo lobby and perhaps move up Cuba on President Bush's increasingly crowded foreign policy agenda.  http://www.nytimes.com

LOAD-DATE: November 22, 2001