[asia-apec 1352] Women's Statement Against AOA/WTO

[tpl at cheerful.com]

Join the fight against WTO and globalization!
Be a signatory or endorse this statement.

WOMEN'S STATEMENT AGAINST AOA/WTO
presented by GABRIELA and AMIHAN
in the Peoples' Assembly Session: Women Say NO to WTO!
November 29, 1999
Seattle, Washington, U.S.A.

Stop Trading Off Peoples' Lives and Future!
Take Agriculture Out of WTO!
Junk WTO!
Women Say NO to Imperialist Globalization!


	In Seattle, the stage is set for another trading event that will barter
the lives and future of  women, men and children in exchange for super
profits for monopoly capital. The Millennium  Round of negotiations of the
World Trade Organization (WTO) will definitely be dominated by the US,
Japan, Germany and the rest of the Group of 7. Majority of their people and
the rest of the world will once more be shoved into economic and political
maelstrom. 
 
	We, the impoverished producers  of Asia, await with much apprehension the
outcome of the 3rd WTO  Ministerial Meeting, one of which main agenda is a
review of the Agreement on Agriculture (AOA). And not without enough basis.
Most of our governments are gearing to further open up our markets for
agricultural products and our lands and other resources to corporate
plunder. The same formula that is whittling away whatever control we still
have on our products and resources. 

	No doubt the dominant players in the game, the US, Japan and EU will again
battle to squeeze out more concessions despite the astonishing array of
concessions already gained in the previous rounds.	 

	No doubt governments of developing countries,  will beg for more favors,
promise more bargains and make more compromises  to keep  them  on board
ship.  

	In the end, among the major losers in this trading game are the poor
producers:  the peasants, farmers, agricultural workers, the women and the
children without whose labor there could be no products to be traded,
without whose labor there could be no trade in agriculture to speak of.

	In the end, the gainers are the national ruling elite, made up of the big
landowners and big business, and the transnational corporations (TNCs)
whose monopoly control of the land, trade and production technology already
assures them of the lion's share of the region's productive output. Once
more, monopoly capital gets the loot.

	We, who toil daily under the scorching sun to produce 91% of the world's
rice, barely have enough rice to eat. We, who work in the plantations of
bananas, pineapples, rubber and palm oil, barely have enough cash to send
our children to school and buy medicine when we get sick. Official data
tell it all. Asia is home to rich natural resources and strong human power.
It is home to an unparalleled ecological heritage, yet it remains the home
of 70% of the world's poor. 
 
	We therefore re-state in the strongest terms: We have never benefited
from our governments' commitments to the AOA and the rest of the WTO
agreements. 

	The market access provision of the AOA, which provides for tariff
reduction, is eschewed to the advantage of  industrialized countries which
start off  with high tariff rate bases and therefore end up still being
able to protect their local markets. The developing countries are left with
their local markets wide open for imports thus displacing their local
products. 

	But developing countries have to sell and trade, say our governments which
are still keeping blind to the fact that all of globalization's promises
have failed. "Equal playing field" under imperialist globalization is a lot
of nonsense. There can be no free trade nor fair trade in a world system
dominated by monopoly capital. 

	Our governments continue to offer us as sacrificial lambs to the so-called
'global competitiveness'. Intensification of exploitation of our labor and
the natural resources are resorted to in order to produce products at the
cheapest price possible. Men, women and children are made to work almost as
slaves on mere pittance.  Family labor is mobilized  in exchange for
compensation fit for paupers. 

	Another anomaly is the domestic support provision of the AOA which
mandates a reduction of production subsidies for the farmers. Various
estimates point, that even with a 20% subsidy reduction, governments of
developed countries can still can afford to provide billions of subsidies
to their farmers in various forms  without them being declared WTO illegal.

	One the other hand, we from the developing countries have to fend for
ourselves. Our cash-strapped and debt-burdened governments are only too
happy to take away our already low subsidies. With little or no support
from government, and with high production inputs, our local products cannot
compete with the cheap, highly subsidized imported products that flood  our
markets. 
 
	The WTO has spelled disaster on us and our natural resources. Large tracts
of lands devoted  for the production of staple food are converted for the
cultivation of products for trade. Worse, our lands and forests are taken
away from us to pave the way for conversion to golf courses and other
tourism resorts, grandiose mal-development projects like dams, mining and
logging concessions and so-called industrial centers. We are left landless
and ruined.

	Of great concern is our food security, our capacity to produce our own
food and its accessibility to every one. We can never subscribe to the idea
peddled by most of our governments that food security is simply the
availability of food and that we are better off importing cheap food from
other countries. 

	These products have been flooding the local market, competing with locally
produced ones which have become relatively more expensive because of higher
production cost due to withdrawal of subsidies and lower tariff for the
imported ones. Imported products continue to threaten, if not already
putting an end to, the viability of local products.  Worse, with the trade
of even our staple food like rice and corn, in the hands of cartels, price
manipulation resulting into steep increases in the prices of these
commodities, have been resorted to. Heavier pressure is created on our
already very tight food budget.

	Our health suffers from all the chemicals introduced in agricultural
production and the pollutants from mining and industrial operations that
poison our lands, air, seas, rivers and other bodies of water. 

	For us, WTO means greater exploitation of our labor and resources, further
ruin of our sources of livelihood and steady deterioration of our already
meager income. These further translate to hunger, malnutrition and
worsening of our life situations. 

	For us women, the squeeze is even tighter. As our meager family income is
further reduced, our husbands are forced to depart our villages in search
of jobs. Many do not return, leaving us women on our own to keep the rest
of the family alive. Our working hours are doubled or tripled to augment
our income and find food for the children. 

	Hundreds of thousands of us are likewise forced to leave for the urban
areas and even other countries in the hope of finding jobs. Many end up
being victimized by labor and sex traffickers. And some of us have
prostituted ourselves as unwilling commodities in the sex trade.  

	To make matters worse, the collusion among the imperialist powers, the
local ruling elite and the state, that they dominate, goes beyond the
economic sphere. To stifle peoples' opposition and to protect monopoly
capital business interests, the state unleashes its military and
paramilitary forces against the women, men and communities resisting
globalization. Militarist aggression is the imperialists' and the state's
answer to legitimate peoples' demands.  

	We, therefore, affirm our commitment to  resist and fight imperialist
globalization and its newest conduit - the WTO. Let their trading begin.
But let us fight to have our lives and our future spared. 

Take Agriculture out of WTO!
Junk WTO!
Strengthen international solidarity 
  and advance the peoples' struggle against imperialism!


[Initiated by AMIHAN, GABRIELA, KMP and BAYAN.] 


Printed Name   Organization   Country    Tel/Fax/Email   	

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: W-stmt.doc
Type: application/octet-stream
Size: 18944 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://list.jca.apc.org/manage/private/asia-apec/attachments/19991130/744770b8/W-stmt.bin