Farm Bureau’s Randy Veach: Brazil Access In Cuba Threatens Opportunities For Arkansas

Editor’s note: Arkansas Farm Bureau President Randy Veach, a cotton, soybean, rice and corn farmer from Manila (Mississippi County) is among the business leaders who joined Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson on a trade mission to Cuba. Below is a brief discussion by Veach of his time thus far in Cuba:

On Wednesday, most of the Arkansas delegation went to the port city of Mariel, which is about 40 miles west of Havana, to view a new container port that was recently built. Mariel is the closest port to the United States, and their new container facilities are state of the art, with double rail systems in and out of the facility, connecting the site to the rest of the island. It has about 450 full-time workers there, and they have plans for expansion. With a facility like this, you can see the Cuban government has plans for increasing the efficiency for inbound and outbound products.

There are several other countries that have partnered with the Cuban government, and they maintain storage facilities for their products. Brazil is among the countries doing business through the Mariel port, trading quite a few agricultural commodities (rice, poultry, soybeans, in particular). If we hesitate too long before normalizing trade with Cuba, those markets could well be lost to Brazil.

The Cuban government has plans to make the entire area around the port a commercial zone, as a way to spur additional trade. Manufacturing will move in and provide additional revenues. The biggest thing the Cubans need is outside investment. Right now, the port is not deep enough for post-Panamax ships, though they explained that they intend to dredge and deepen the port to enable additional shipping.

After touring the port, Gov. Hutchinson met with several trade officials, and took part in an international news conference Wednesday evening. CNN covered the event.

This trip has affirmed for me that we have a good opportunity to sell more Arkansas farm products to Cuba, we just need the political and governmental issues that limit that opportunity to be resolved.