Chamber of Commerce Campaigns For U.S. Cuba Travel, Trade Reforms

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is calling on the House Foreign Affairs Committee to approve legislation that would lift agricultural trade and travel restrictions against Cuba.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is calling on the House Foreign Affairs Committee to approve legislation that would lift agricultural trade and travel restrictions against Cuba . In a letter to committee Chairman Howard Berman (D-Calif.) and ranking member Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), the chamber asks that the committee to "report this legislation to the full House swiftly and without amendment so that the House can consider and approve this measure in the very near term.

Berman is a co-sponsor of the legislation; Ros-Lehtinen is a vocal opponent of any U.S. moves to soften the country's half-century-old stance toward Cuba.

Cuba has been under a wide-ranging U.S. trade embargo for some 50 years, including a travel ban. The embargo was aimed at toppling the communist regime formerly led by Fidel Castro and now by his brother Raul. So far, that strategy has not worked.

The proposal would allow direct financial transactions for agricultural sales to Cuba and require agricultural exports to Cuba to meet the same payment requirements as exports to other countries. The measure also would end the requirement applicable to Cuba that payments to U.S. agricultural sellers must pass through banks in third countries.

Also, U.S. travel restrictions to Cuba would end under the bill, reducing the bureaucratic red tape currently required for individuals to travel to Cuba to facilitate new agriculture sales.

The House Agriculture Committee voted in June to approve the bill. 

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