URGENT ACTION NEEDED: CAFTA VOTE ANTICIPATED WEDNESDAY JULY 27!
SUCCESS FOR JUSTICE IS IN OUR REACH! TAKE ACTION TODAY ON CAFTA
Lutheran World Relief and the Lutheran Office for Governmental Affairs are asking you to contact your representative and appeal to them to vote NO on DR-CAFTA. The House of Representatives may vote on July 27. Your voice needs to be heard! Please take a moment to call or fax your elected officials using information below.
If you contacted your Representative about CAFTA last week, THANK YOU! And please call again. It's going to be a close vote, and each time they hear from you it's an opportunity for them to understand more fully how important this issues is to people of faith.
DR-CAFTA is a treaty purported to liberalize trade between the United States , Dominican Republic , Costa Rica , El Salvador , Guatemala , Honduras and Nicaragua . Trade representatives from all seven countries signed the treaty May 28, 2004. Each country's national assembly must ratify the treaty. Here in the United States , this means Congress must approve the treaty. The Senate narrowly passed the DR-CAFTA, by a vote of 54-45. The battle against this unfair, undemocratic and unjust trade agreement now moves to the U.S. House of Representatives.
LWR is opposed to DR-CAFTA for the following reasons.
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Trade agreements should be developed and implemented with full participation of all sectors of society. In many of the countries involved in DR-CAFTA, the process followed was secretive, with practically no input from their citizens, particularly the poor.
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Many Central Americans rely on agriculture for their livelihoods; if CAFTA is passed, most small farmers in Central America will be unable to compete with low cost US-subsidized agricultural products.
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Currently, when a drug patent expires, manufacturers may request approval to produce generic versions of the drug. Under DR-CAFTA, manufacturers or governments in Central America will not be able to produce generic versions of drugs for five years, even in a public health emergency. An estimated 275,000 Central Americans are living with HIV/AIDS, yet under DR-CAFTA, they would be unable to access affordable generic drugs.
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The US State Department and the International Labor Organization (ILO) have expressed concern over the state of labor rights in the region; under CAFTA these inadequate worker protections would be weakened, leaving maquiladora , plantation, and, -- in fact -- all workers increasingly vulnerable to abuse.
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CAFTA, like NAFTA, includes anti-democratic provisions that allow foreign corporations to sue local governments if health, safety, or environmental laws interfere with their profit. This law would apply equally in the US as well as in Central America; in fact, under NAFTA, the US has been sued for not allowing foreign-owned factories to release carcinogenic compounds into US waterways.
Lutheran World Relief believes that DR-CAFTA will harm, rather than help, farmers and workers in Central America who are struggling to overcome poverty; and for this reason, we oppose its ratification. We call on members of Congress to vote against the Central America Free Trade Agreement.
MORE INFORMATION
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Trade will not work unless it's fair-fair for Central America and fair for American workers. This trade agreement is flawed. (Walter Jones, Catholic, R-NC) |
Representatives Sherrod Brown, (D-OH, Lutheran) and Walter Jones (R-NC, Catholic) spoke recently at an interfaith, bipartisan prayer breakfast that LWR sponsored. To read their statements, see http://jones.house.gov/html/release.cfm?id=324 and http://www.house.gov/sherrodbrown/faithbased.htm .
To learn more about LWR's work on trade justice, please visit: www.lwr.org/advocacy/tradejustice/index.asp .
To read more about LOGA's position on DR-CAFTA, visit their website at www.elca.org/advocacy and click on "action alerts."
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Rep. Brown joins leaders of the Lutheran, Jewish, Quaker, and Presbyterian community in breaking symbolic chains of injustice, at the recent interfaith prayer breakfast. |
CALLING YOUR REPRESENTATIVE
Locate your Member of Congress at www.house.gov. You can call the office numbers listed on their webpage or call the Congressional switchboard at 202-224-3121 and they will connect you to the right office.
The vote is tentatively scheduled for July 27, although it can be changed.don't delay, call today!
SUGGESTED TALKING POINTS
(These are just suggestions -- there's no need to follow them closely. In fact, the more personal you can make your message, the better. These talking points just provide a summary of some of the main points you may want to discuss -- and, for those less familiar with the issue, a guide for your call.)
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Introduce yourself to the aide or the voice mail. State your name, where you are from and any groups you represent.
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Explain that, as a person of faith, you are concerned that CAFTA will harm the poorest citizens of Central America by reducing worker protection, weakening environmental laws, and making it harder for small farm families to survive in the face of agribusiness imports into their nations.
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Be sure to thank the listener for their time and ask that the Representative vote NO on DR-CAFTA.
If you would prefer to fax your message, you may use the following as a guide. Your Representative's fax number may be found at: www.house.gov
The Honorable ______
U.S. Senate/ U.S. House of Representatives
Washington , D.C. 20510 /20515
Dear Representative ______:
I urge you to vote NO on DR-CAFTA when it comes to the floor. Your vote against CAFTA will be a vote FOR just economic policies and communities in the United States and Central America .
DR-CAFTA fails to meet up to basic standards of justice and fairness. Among other things, CAFTA:
- Was not negotiated within a framework of democratic accountability and did not include broad-based citizen participation.
- Requires Central American countries to eliminate import tariffs on staple products such as rice, beans, yellow corn and dairy products. Without the protection of tariffs, Central America will be vulnerable to the dumping of U.S. farm products, risking massive displacement of farmers and increased food insecurity in Central America.
- Does not exempt essential public services, such as education, health care, or water from the national treatment standards. Governments will lose the flexibility to subsidize these services and guarantee adequate provision of these services to citizens.
- Does not include adequate enforcement of internationally recognized labor and environmental standards.
- Prohibits governments in the region from ensuring that foreign investment serves national development goals, and has a provision -- like NAFTA's infamous Chapter 11 -- that would allow foreign corporations to sue governments that pass strong labor, public health or environmental laws.
DR-CAFTA will not benefit hardworking people in the United States and Central America . I urge you to stand up for trade justice by voting NO to CAFTA and ensuring that U.S. trade policies promote fair trade and sustainable development designed to reduce poverty in the U.S. and the region.
Sincerely,
THANK YOU FOR YOUR SOLIDARITY WITH THE PEOPLE OF CENTRAL AMERICA!
