• Submitted by: admin
• Business and Economy
• 05 / 26 / 2010

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HOUSTON — The Port of Houston has reached an agreement to ship directly to Cuba, opening the door for more jobs and even a thriving cruise-line business.

"Our dream scenario is that we would end up in the cruise business with Cuba," said Jim Edmonds, chairman of the Port of Houston Authority. "I think that would be a popular destination."

The partnership has the potential to bring thousands of jobs to the Houston area, port officials said. Already the nation’s largest petrochemical complex, the Port of Houston directly and indirectly impacts 785,000 jobs in Texas.

The U.S. Commerce Department recently – and quietly – approved a shipping contract for a company looking to transport goods directly between Houston and the island nation. It marks another step in the process of the Obama administration thawing relations with the communist country.

A series of embargoes have strictly limited trade with Cuba since 1962.

But in 2009, U.S. trade with the island located just 90 miles off the Florida Keys was estimated at more than $500 million.

Texas wants a bigger piece of that. Right now, the Lone Star State is a distant second behind Louisiana in exports to Cuba.

A previous policy prohibited container cargo from being shipped to Cuba by any state besides Florida.

Moving the cargo to Florida was proving cost-prohibitive for many companies, so port officials have been actively lobbying Congress and the Obama administration to ease trade restrictions.

Edmonds said Cuba is very interested in importing goods from Texas, including grain, poultry, and flour. Port officials are also looking forward to the ability to ship steel to rehabilitate the country’s crumbling infrastructure.

Still, there are critics that wonder whether the U.S. should be doing business with a communist country.

"We trade with communist nations all the time," Edmonds said. "I look at this as a trade opportunity, not politics."

By Gabe Gutierrez / 11 News

Source: www.khou.com/