Havana , Cuba ( CNN ) -- Richard Waltzer has a pitch for Cuba : Miller beer and Häagen-Dazs ice cream . If he has his way , those products soon will be available at supermarkets and beach resorts on the communist island . `` This is one of the things people are going to pay premium for , '' Waltzer said , `` especially the tourists that have the dollars . It 's going to be a phenomenal product . '' This week , dozens of Americans are in Havana , peddling their wares at an international trade fair : apples , pears , grapes , raisins , nuts out of California . U.S.-Cuba relations appear to be thawing . In Havana , billboards depicting the U.S. president as Adolf Hitler have disappeared . In Washington , President Obama has lifted restrictions on Cuban-American travel and money transfers . The new political climate has prompted companies such as Chicago Foods to come to Havana 's trade fair for the first time . They 're hoping to break into the little-known market and go home with a contract . Despite a trade embargo imposed against Cuba in 1962 , the United States is the No . 1 supplier of food to that country and has been for more than five years . A law passed in 2000 allows the United States to export agricultural products and medicine . But this year , the global economic crisis is taking its toll . `` Cuba has not been an exception , '' said Rodrigo Malmierca Diaz , minister of foreign trade and investment . `` At the end of the third quarter in 2009 , our trade fell by 36 percent . '' The country is slashing imports of U.S. food by one-third , which means some vendors will go home empty-handed . But vendors are betting U.S.-Cuba relations will only get better . They said they 're also hoping the next step could be bills in the U.S. Congress that would eliminate restrictions on all Americans traveling to Cuba . `` We 're in this for the long haul as well , '' said Paul Johnson of Chicago Foods . `` Like I said before , we 're thinking about today as well as tomorrow . '' A tomorrow that would have U.S. tourists sipping American beer on Cuban beaches .
New political climate allows foreign companies to come to Cuban trade fair for first time . U.S. companies want to break into Cuba and go home with a bang . Cuba also reeling from global economic crisis . Cuba is cutting supply of U.S. food by one - third .