Open
World Conference of Workers
In Defense of Trade Union Independence & Democratic Rights
OWC Coordinators Call on Working People to Mobilize to Defeat CAFTA
We call on you to help mobilize working people and their organizations
across the United States, Mexico and Central America to defeat the Central
American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). We need you to work to ensure the
defeat of CAFTA in the U.S. Congress, and to urge the governments of
Central America to withdraw from CAFTA negotiations.
What is CAFTA?
CAFTA is a regional agreement between the United States and five
Central American countries: Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua,
and Costa Rica. The Dominican Republic was "docked" onto the
agreement in March 2004. (Costa Rica has since withdrawn from CAFTA
negotiations.)
CAFTA could come up for a vote in the U.S. Congress as early as June 2004.
The Bush administration is actively seeking passage of CAFTA as a
strategic step in the race toward a larger prize: the Free Trade Area of
the Americas (FTAA), which would include every country in Central America,
South America, and the Caribbean, except Cuba.
Why should working people in the United States and across Central America
oppose CAFTA?
The California Campaign for Fair Trade and Human Rights compiled a series
of reasons, or talking points, to mobilize widespread opposition to CAFTA.
This packet, along with greetings, were sent by the California Campaign
for Fair Trade and Human Rights to the Mexicali conference. Here are some
of the reasons they list:
* The U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) expands the
"free trade" model of the North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA) that has failed workers and working families in Canada, Mexico and
the United States.
* The negotiation process for such agreements is not democratic,
open or transparent
* The CAFTA labor provisions fail to meet core International Labor
Organization standards, provide ineffective enforcement mechanisms, and
are woefully inadequate to prevent continued job flight from the United
States, or to protect workers in Central America.
* The goal of the NAFTA "free trade" model is to remove
"tariff and non-tariff barriers to trade." The
"barriers" sought for removal are laws, rules and regulations
established in the framework of national states in the service of labor
rights, environmental protection, national economic development, public
health, food security and human rights.
* CAFTA threatens to severely impede new labor laws in the United
States, including prevailing wage laws, project labor agreements on
government construction, and local or union purchasing preferences, and;
* CAFTA would extend NAFTA's assault on manufacturing jobs in the
United States.
* CAFTA could require the privatization of federal, state and local
government services, and of at least parts of the US Postal Service.
* The CAFTA rules on trade in services significantly alters
regulation of services, and grants greater control to business in
regulating and providing services such as health care, construction,
telecommunications, education, tourism, water distribution, and energy
services.
CAFTA and Workers' Rights
The California Campaign For Fair Trade and Human Rights produced a
separate memo that exposes the inadequacies of workers' rights provisions
under CAFTA in greater detail. Here are some of the salient points in
their document:
* CAFTA fails to include standards set by the International Labor
Organization (ILO) and instead, only provides for action to be taken in
the case of a county's repeated failure to enforce its existing domestic
laws, regardless of how inadequate these laws may be. In addition, this
provision has substantial loopholes for non-enforcement so that it would
be extremely difficult to take action when countries fail to enforce their
labor laws in an effort to attract investment.
* Even if a case can be argued against a country's non-enforcement
of its domestic labor laws, the penalties available for non-enforcement
are extremely weak. A country that repeatedly fails to enforce its own
labor laws under CAFTA is merely required to pay a fine to improve labor
rights enforcement -- the amounts of these fines are capped, and the money
paid by an offending country is actually paid back to that violating
country. There is no mechanism in place to guarantee that these fines
would actually be used to improve labor law enforcement. In such the fines
could easily be treated as a cost of increased investment, ensuring that
enforcement failures would continue. The weak penalties provided for
violation of CAFTA's labor provisions are in contrast to powerful trade
sanctions and cash damages provided for violation of CAFTA's commercial
provisions.
* The lack of meaningful workers' rights protections in CAFTA is
particularly harmful in light of Central America's poor record on workers'
rights. Worker's rights currently in the CAFTA countries do not come
anywhere close to meeting international standards. Workers regularly
suffer discrimination and abuse. Union-busting tactics, discrimination
against women, and the use of child labor are widespread practices in
Central America, where labor rights protections are wholly inadequate. In
El Salvador and Nicaragua, workers fired for union organizing have no
right to be reinstated; the Ministry of Labor in El Salvador often ignores
the anti-union conduct of employers, and impedes workers' right to freedom
of association.
These types of labor rights violations are endemic to the region. Indeed,
attacks on labor organizers in Guatemala have resulted in torture and even
murder.
* Export Processing Zones (or EPZs) where maquila factories
operate are already prevalent throughout Central America and would expand
dramatically under CAFTA. EPZs are areas of land where goods can be
manufactured without taxes or export duties, as would normally be
required. EPZs are also known for their human rights abuses and
non-enforcement of health, safety, and labor regulations in what are often
sweatshop factory conditions. Most of the clothing production in the
region already takes place in EPZs where foreign companies hire mostly
women aged 15-25 to provide cheap labor under poor working conditions.
Women and girls working in the maquiladora sector in Guatemala, for
example, though formally protected under the law, encounter persistent
discrimination -- including mandatory pregnancy tests as a condition of
employment; denying reproductive health care to pregnant workers; and even
firing pregnant women.
* What's more, maquila workers often endure relentless hostility
toward union organizing, inhumane working hours, and working environments
that compromise health and safety.
More Than Ever, We Must Mobilize Today to Defeat CAFTA!
The good news is that the CAFTA agreement has yet to be passed and it can
be stopped. We can defeat CAFTA in Congress with education and
organization.
Unionists and activists interested in learning more about what they can do
to stop CAFTA should contact the Citizens Trade Campaign Against CAFTA.
Visit their website at www.citizenstrade.org
or contact the office directly at (202) 778-3320. The Campaign can also be
reached at P.O. Box 77077 Washington, DC 20013.
-- OWC Co-Coordinators