JUAN O. TAMAYO
             Herald Staff Writer

             Ignoring cautions from Washington and Havana, American firms are rushing to
             explore the prospects for doing business in Cuba opened by the recent relaxation
             of U.S. sanctions against the island.

             ``Enthusiasm is off the charts in my group,'' said Pamela Falk, a New York lawyer
             who was recently in Havana with a delegation of major U.S. grain producers to
             deliver a donation of animal feed to independent Cuban farmers.

             The interest awakened after the Clinton administration announced Jan. 5 that it
             would ease controls on food and agricultural sales to Cuba as part of a package
             designed to promote independent and pro-democracy groups.

             Miami business consultant Teo Babun said he received about 15 calls from
             interested U.S. firms after the announcement, and the New York-based
             U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council said it saw a doubling of ``hits'' on its
             Web page -- www.cubatrade.org -- for Jan. 5-7.

             The council also received calls from Canadian, French and Argentine firms now
             doing business in Cuba, wondering whether the changes would mean increased
             U.S. competition for them, council director John Kavulich said.

             U.S agro-giant Archer Daniels Midland quickly announced it had already obtained
             a ``substantial'' sales order from a Cuban ``entity'' it refused to identify, and said it
             would seek a U.S. permit to close the deal.

             `In the right direction'

             ``We believe the new measures are a step in the right direction . . . but we would
             like these measures to go further,'' said Rebecca Frailey, assistant vice president at
             New York-based Continental Grain Co.

             While not large by world standards, Cuba represents a virgin market for U.S.
             agricultural producers, a U.S.-embargoed island of 11 million people 90 miles
             away that in 1995 imported $454 million in basic food products.

             That included an estimated one million tons of wheat and flour plus sizable
             quantities of rice, beans, cooking oil, soy meal and powdered milk, according to a
             Trade and Economic Council report issued last week.

             But it does not include imports of fertilizers, pesticides and seed, allowed by the
             new U.S. measures, or agricultural implements such as tractors, engines, fencing
             and grain silos.

             Opening the U.S. doors to such sales might have a ``multiplier effect'' and require
             easing other U.S. sanctions, such as one banning freighters that dock in Cuba from
             docking in U.S. ports for the next 180 days.

             `Brainstorming' in progress

             ``That's the kind of brainstorming going on right now in the business community,''
             Babun said. ``If they can sell fertilizers, who finances the deal? Do you allow
             bank-to-bank transfers?'' Up to now, such transfers have been banned by the
             37-year-old embargo.

             ``Everyone's mind is on the possible,'' said Falk, who is writing a book on Cuba
             and teaches international trade at the City University of New York Law School.

             ``If the U.S. government implements these measures in an expansive manner, those
             foreign firms will have reason to worry about U.S. competition,'' Kavulich said.

             U.S. officials say that's definitely not their intention.

             Tractor and silo sales to Cuba? ``That's not what we said,'' one top U.S. official
             said, noting that the Jan. 5 announcement had carefully used the term ``agricultural
             inputs'' instead of ``implements.

             And while the Trade and Economic Council reported that ``independent'' buyers
             might include state-founded cooperatives known as UBPCs, which farm 43
             percent of Cuba's arable land, U.S. officials said that's unlikely for now.

             Focus on landowners

             ``We are generally thinking of farmers who hold title to their own land, who till
             their own land and who have a demonstrable amount of independence'' from the
             Communist government, said one U.S. official involved in drawing up the detailed
             regulations for the new measures.

             The regulations will probably initially require all food and agricultural sales to be
             licensed by the U.S. Treasury or Commerce departments ``on a case-by-case
             basis,'' the official added.

             Prospective sellers should initially think in terms of very small shipments, the official
             continued, such as 50-pound bags of rice, perhaps a pallet of such bags, at most a
             40-foot container of such bags.

             One possible example would be the system that U.S. diplomats stationed abroad
             use to buy U.S. goods: catalog orders -- say, a case of canned soup -- to a firm in
             the United States, which then consolidates all orders and ships them to the
             embassies aboard freight containers.

             ``We're still very much at the early stages of this regulation writing process, but it is
             very probable that we will first establish some general descriptions, then look at
             the early requests on a case-by-case basis,'' said one U.S. official who has sat in
             on multiagency task forces created to handle previous regulation changes on Cuba.

             Thinking big

             Such a small-scale opening would sorely disappoint U.S. business interests.

             ``That would be a hollow offer,'' Falk said.

             Added Hermenegildo Altozano, a Spanish lawyer deeply involved in Cuba
             business deals: ``It would be a poisoned gift.''

             That's exactly what Cuba called the new U.S. measures. ``Crumbs,'' said
             Economics Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez. ``These measures cannot but be
             rejected,'' added National Assembly chief Ricardo Alarcon.

             Further darkening the business people's prospects, the heads of the U.S. House
             and Senate foreign affairs committees have warned that any significant U.S.
             licensing of food and agricultural sales to Cuba might be illegal.

             The 1996 Helms-Burton law turned the embargo into law, giving Congress alone
             the power to significantly change its provisions. Clinton administration officials
             argue they still have the right to tighten or ease regulations.

             ``As much as I might want to sell something,'' the Spanish lawyer Altozano said,
             ``if the American side and the Cuban side don't want to, this won't amount to
             anything more than a smoke screen.''
 

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