U.S. farms want Biden to allow more investment in Cuba

US President Joe Biden eased restrictions on travel, remittances and migration last May and promised the United States would do more to support Cuba's nascent private sector.

Change, however, has been too slow, said Paul Johnson, chairman of the US Agricultural Coalition for Cuba, a more than 100-member organization that includes national and regional organizations, corporations and manufacturers.

“We are losing and we are tired of losing,” Johnson told reporters on the sidelines of a meeting at a hotel in Havana.

American businesses are seeking both to sell their products to Cuba and to invest in private farms and cooperatives to help them develop.

Little has changed on the island since a similar group of potential investors arrived last April. Many farms were closed due to lack of investment, equipment, fuel and supplies, leading to widespread food shortages in Cuba.

“This is frustrating for us in the United States because we believe this is something we can fix. We need to get back to our government … and insist that the private sector is the way forward for development,” Johnson said.

Cuba, a longtime enemy of the United States, switched from capitalism to socialism shortly after Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution, preferring the state to private enterprise.

But in August 2021, the Communist-led government lifted a ban on private companies that had been in place since 1968. According to the list updated on March 23 by the Ministry of Economy, more than 7,000 such enterprises have been opened since then.

Investors from countries including Mexico, Venezuela, Vietnam, China , Spain and Russia have previously been involved in public and private business in Cuba.

The United States remains an exception. The US Treasury Department last May authorized a company owned by entrepreneur John Kavulich to invest in a small private business in Cuba's service sector, the first such permit in decades.

But many other such requests remain unanswered, Johnson said.

“Obviously that’s not enough,” Johnson said. “We are capitalists. We invest in private businesses around the world. Why can't we do it in Cuba?"

Despite the relaxation of some restrictions, the US Cold War embargo on Cuba remains in place, banning some trade and financing between the two countries and making investment ties more difficult.