George Bush and his administration are pushing another trade deal which threatens to destroy more U.S. jobs. The “Free Trade Area of the Americas” is expected to be finalized in 2004 and be fully implemented by the end of 2005. The agreement is with 31 countries of North, South, Central America
and the Caribbean (Cuba was not invited to participate).
The “Free Trade Area of the Americas” (FTAA), like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), is an investment and business agreement that primarily benefits big business and will hurt working people and farmers.
FTAA deals mainly with protecting business by enforcing patents and trademarks, by protecting private property and investments, by guaranteeing the free movement of capital and profits by business, by allowing for unrestricted movement of business persons within the countries of the FTAA, by removing and finally eliminating tariffs on agricultural products and duties on goods, by prohibiting governments from favoring domestic companies or discriminating against companies from other countries of the FTAA.
FTAA will destroy U.S. jobs
FTAA will lead to the elimination of more jobs in the U.S. as companies increase investments and expand production in the
lower wage countries of South and Central America. This happened after NAFTA was passed and we can expect the same thing to happen with the FTAA.
Within four years after NAFTA was passed in 1993, tens of thousands of U.S. manufacturing jobs were lost. A study by the
Economic Policy Institute, NAFTA at Seven, reports that the United States lost 766,030 jobs, while Canada has seen 276,000
jobs disappear as the result of NAFTA.
Cheap labor—high social cost
Most of the job losses were in the manufacturing of motor vehicles, textiles and apparel, computers and electrical appliances. These products are now being manufactured by U.S.controlled Mexican maquiladora companies, that employ mostly oung, female workers and brutally suppress union organizing.
Take an example from the food processing industry. In the four years after NAFTA, U.S. food companies more than doubled
their investments in Mexico—from $2.3 billion in 1993 to $5.0 billion in 1997. U.S. food giants like Cargill, Smithfield Foods, Coca Cola, Campbell Soup, General Mills, Ralston Purina, and Tyson bought out Mexican food processors or set up their own factories in Mexico, taking advantage of the cheaper labor and secure in the knowledge that NAFTA will protect their investments and profits. Today, U.S. companies account for almost half of all direct foreign investments in Mexico.
In Hawaii, eight sugar companies shut down and 3,000 sugar jobs were lost after NAFTA was passed in 1993. Hilo Coast Processing Company, Hamakua Sugar Company, Oahu Sugar, Wailuku Ag, Ka‘u Sugar, Waialua Sugar, McBryde Sugar, and Amfac Sugar Kauai are now history.
Investor dream, worker nightmare
The passage of FTAA will open up the entire Western Hemisphere for the expansion of U.S. companies and investments by
the rich. Jobs will be created in Costa Rica, Brazil, Columbia, and elsewhere is South and Central America, while jobs will be lost in the U.S. FTAA reduces, then eliminates, tariffs on plant and food products from South and Central America, which will
probably mean the end of Hawaii’s sugar, pineapple, and macadamia industries.
The ILWU and the U.S. labor movement is working to defeat the passage of the FTAA. The agreement is still being finalized and must be ratified by the U.S. Congress. The labor movement is planning protest demonstrations at the next big meeting of the trade ministers from the U.S. and the 31 countries of the FTAA which is scheduled to meet in Miami, Florida, in November 2003.
