IS CUBA AN EMERGING MARKET FOR IOWA AGRICULTURE?
The Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000 allowed United States’ food and agricultural products into Cuba for the first time in 40 years. Opening Cuba’s borders to U.S. exports sparked little enthusiasm at first from the U.S. Departments of Agriculture or State. But recent trips by the Iowa trade delegation to Cuba have discovered what could be a lucrative market for Iowa agricultural interests, according to Tom Rial of the Iowa Export Assistance Center and Midwest Agribusiness Trade Research and Information Center. Writing in the latest edition of the Iowa Ag Review, the newsletter of the Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD) at Iowa State University, Rial cites a study that concludes Iowa could gain more than $70 million in agricultural sales to Cuba, with an additional spin-off of more than $206 million into the Iowa economy. Rial says with aggressive marketing efforts, Iowa pork, beef, processed egg products, animal feed, and soy protein and oil c
