Pressure Your MP Day: Monday November 5, 2001


A new round of trade expansion will speed up global insecurities, not eliminate them. We need to demand of our politicians that the WTO trade talks be halted.

Instead, governments and citizens around the world need to evaluate the WTO and its impact so far. And we need to re-think and re-define the role and responsibilities of government itself in this age of corporate-driven globalization.

We need a new fair trade agenda

Monday, November 5th, 2001 PRESSURE YOUR MP

Call your MP on Monday, November 5th, MP Pressure Day!

TELL YOUR MP:

• NO new round of trade talks at the WTO!
• NO to the GATS!
• We need common security through fair trade!

To find your MP:

• Call 1-800-O-Canada or
• visit www.parl.gc.ca and click on "Senators & Members", then "House of Commons, Current".

To send an "Email to Fax" to your MP: (free)
visit http://dawn.thot.net/Action.html

CONTACT KEY MINISTERS

The WTO is trading in global insecurity: we need fair trade for a safer world. Tell the Prime Minister and the Minister for International Trade:

• NO new round of trade talks at the WTO!
• NO to the GATS!
• We need common security through fair trade!

Contact Prime Minister Jean Chretien

• By phone: 613 992 4211
• By fax: 613 941 6900
• By email: pm@pm.gc.ca
• By Email to Fax: remote-printer.Jean_Chretien@16139416900.iddd.tpc.int
  
• By mail: 309-S Centre Block, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0A6

Contact Pierre Pettigrew, Minister of International Trade

• By phone: 613 995 8872
• By fax: 613 995 9926
• By email: Pettigrew.P@parl.gc.ca
• By Email to Fax: remote-printerPierre_Pettigrew@16139952174.iddd.tpc.int
• By mail: 507 Confederation Building, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0A6

SOCIAL INSECURITY: HEALTH CARE AT RISK

Public services, like health care and education, are the best way to build collective security for all people. But health care will be gravely threatened if the WTO expands the GATS.

Call Allan Rock, Minister of Health, and ask him to pass along your concerns to Pierre Pettigrew and Jean Chretien.

Contact Allan Rock, Minister of Health

• By phone: 613 947 5000
• By fax: 613 947 4276
• By email: Rock.A@parl.gc.ca
• By Email to Fax: remote-printer.Allan_Rock@16139474276.iddd.tpc.int
• By mail: 441-S Centre Block, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0A6

ECOLOGICAL INSECURITY: ENVIRONMENT THREATENED

WTO decisions and rules damage the environment because they put corporate rights over environmental rights. The WTO makes it harder for David Anderson, Environment Minister, to protect the environment.

Call him and urge him to take your concerns to Pierre Pettigrew and Jean Chretien.

Contact David Anderson, Minister of the Environment:

• By phone: 613 996 2358
• By fax: 613 952 1458
• By email: Anderson.D@parl.gc.ca
• By Email to Fax: remote-Printer.David_Anderson@16139521458.iddd.tpc.int
• By mail: 133 East Block, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0A6

GLOBAL INSECURITY

The struggle for a safe world must mean a deeper fight for common security, within our own country as well as internationally.

Urge John Manley, Minister for Foreign Affairs, to lead Canada in the international fight for "common security through fair trade," not "corporate security through free trade."

Contact John Manley, Minister for Foreign Affairs

• By phone: 613 992 3269
• By fax: 613 995 1534
• By email: Manley.J@parl.gc.ca
• By Email to Fax: remote-printer.John_Manley@16139951534.iddd.tpc.int
• By mail: 418-N Centre Block, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0A6

CULTURAL INSECURITY

The WTO promotes a global corporate monoculture over cultural diversity by preventing countries from pursuing independent cultural policies.

Call Sheila Copps, Minister for Canadian Heritage, and urge her to take your concerns to Pierre Pettigrew and Jean Chretien.

Contact Sheila Copps, Minister for Canadian Heritage

• By phone: 613 995 2772
• By fax: 613 994 1267
• By email: Copps.S@parl.gc.ca
• By Email to Fax: remote-printer.Sheila_Copps@16139922727.iddd.tpc.int
• By mail: 509-S Centre Block, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0A6

Initiated by Mike and supported by DAWN Ontario

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International Week of Action: Nov - 9 - 13, 2001

International Day of Protest against the WTO -- Novermber 9, 2001

Day of Protest -- November 9th, 2001

Week of Action -- November 9th to 13th, 2001

WE DEMAND NO NEW WTO NEGOTIATING ROUND IN DOHA, QATAR

WE WILL MOBILIZE COMMUNITIES ACROSS CANADA


WHY ARE WE DOING THIS?

Part of the new negotiating round will include negotiations on key agreements like the GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services), TRIPs (Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights) and the AoA (Agreement on Agriculture).

These WTO agreements allow transnational corporations control over every area of our lives -- from healthcare to education to clean and accessible drinking water. We have no say in the decisions our government leaders and their corporate friends are making.

WHO IS DOING THIS?

All of us together! Our community organizations, our friends and neighbours, and our local networks and coalitions -- together we will educate, agitate and organize!!!

To lead up to November 9th, the Common Front on the World Trade Organization (CFWTO) will be hosting public events and supporting a \"Quebec to Qatar\" cross-country caravan to raise awareness about the WTO and to mobilize people for the DAY OF PROTEST and WEEK OF ACTION. Materials will be available by early September, 2001.

Start organizing NOW for November. Ideas include -- public debates, occupying MP offices and/or corporate offices, holding protests outside key corporate headquarters, conducting a corporate friends bus-tour, organizing job walk-outs and direct action.

Join other Canadians and people around the world in protesting this new WTO Round!

For more info and to get involved, sign on to the CFWTO listserve at: http://www.wtoaction.org/cfwto

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Open Letter on Institutional Reforms in the WTO .pdf - 64k

As WTO members meet for the final stretch of negotiations on the draft Ministerial declaration before Doha, the undersigned NGOs urge them to seriously address the systemic inequalities and imbalances, which have prevented them from making meaningful progress on key substantial issues and continue to cast doubts on the legitimacy and transparency of the multilateral trading system. This open-letter focuses on issues and concerns related to internal and external transparency.

International GATS Sign On Document

What is globalization?

Economists define globalization as the increasing internationalization of production, distribution, and marketing of goods and services.

What are some of the pros and cons associated with globalization?

PROS:
Global free trade promotes global economic growth. It creates jobs, makes companies more competitive, and lowers prices for consumers. It also provides poor countries, through infusions of foreign capital and technology, with the chance to develop economically and, by spreading prosperity, creates the conditions in which democracy and respect for human rights may flourish.

CONS:
Multinational economic institutions, such as the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund, are seen as establishing, monitoring, and rendering judgements on global trade practices, and are viewed as the spearheads of economic globalization. These institutions are considered to be the servants of corporate interests, exercising more power than elected governments and interested only in profit.

Sources:
"Globalization: New or Dèjá Vu?" Carsten Hefeker, WWZ, University of Basel.
"Anti-Globalization - A Spreading Phenomenon," Perspectives, Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

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Who are the members of the WTO?

Currently there are 135 member countries in the WTO and 33 nations with observer status. For a list of the 135 members with dates of membership in the WTO see: http://www.wto.org/wto/about/organsn6.htm

What is the GATT and how does it relate to the WTO?

It is probably best to be clear from the start that the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was two things:

• an international agreement, i.e. a document setting out the rules for conducting international trade, and
• an international organization created later to support the agreement. The text of the agreement could be compared to law, the organization was like parliament and the courts combined in a single body.

As its history shows, the attempt to create a fully fledged international trade agency in the 1940s failed. But GATT's drafters agreed that they wanted to use the new rules and disciplines, if only provisionally. Then government officials needed to meet to discuss issues related to the agreement, and to hold trade negotiations. These needed secretarial support, leading to the creation of an ad hoc organization - that continued to exist for almost half a century.

GATT, the international agency, no longer exists. It has now been replaced by the World Trade Organization.

GATT, the agreement, does still exist, but it is no longer the main set of rules for international trade. And it has been updated.

What happened? When GATT was created after the Second World War, international commerce was dominated by trade in goods. Since then, trade in services - transport, travel, banking, insurance, telecommunications, transport, consultancy and so on - has become much more important. So has trade in ideas - inventions and designs, and goods and services incorporating this "intellectual property". The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade always dealt with trade in goods, and it still does. It has been amended and incorporated into the new WTO agreements. The updated GATT lives alongside the new General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) and Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). The WTO brings the three together within a single organization, a single set of rules and a single system for resolving disputes. In short, the WTO is not a simple extension of GATT. It is much more.

While GATT no longer exists as an international organization, the GATT agreement lives on. The old text is now called "GATT 1947". The updated version is called "GATT 1994". Moreover, GATT's key principles have been adopted by the agreements on services and intellectual property. These include non-discrimination, transparency and predictability. As the more mature WTO developed out of GATT, you could say that the child is the father of the man.

Main differences between the WTO and GATT

- GATT was ad hoc and provisional. The General Agreement was never ratified in members' parliaments, and it contained no provisions for the creation of an organization. - The WTO and its agreements are permanent. As an international organization, the WTO has a sound legal basis because members have ratified the WTO agreements, and the agreements themselves describe how the WTO is to function. - The WTO has "members". GATT had "contracting parties", underscoring the fact that officially GATT was a legal text. - GATT dealt with trade in goods. The WTO covers services and intellectual property as well. - The WTO dispute settlement system is faster, more automatic than the old GATT system. Its rulings cannot be blocked.

Source: WTO; http://www.wto.org/wto/about/facts6.htm

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What is the WTO?

The World Trade Organization (WTO) is the only international organization dealing with the global rules of trade between nations. Its main function is to ensure that trade flows as smoothly, predictably and freely as possible.

The result is assurance. Consumers and producers know that they can enjoy secure supplies and greater choice of the finished products, components, raw materials and services that they use. Producers and exporters know that foreign markets will remain open to them.

The result is also a more prosperous, peaceful and accountable economic world. Decisions in the WTO are typically taken by consensus among all member countries and they are ratified by members’ parliaments. Trade friction is channelled into the WTO’s dispute settlement process where the focus is on interpreting agreements and commitments, and how to ensure that countries’ trade policies conform with them. That way, the risk of disputes spilling over into political or military conflict is reduced.

By lowering trade barriers, the WTO’s system also breaks down other barriers between peoples and nations.

At the heart of the system — known as the multilateral trading system — are the WTO’s agreements, negotiated and signed by a large majority of the world’s trading nations, and ratified in their parliaments. These agreements are the legal ground-rules for international commerce. Essentially, they are contracts, guaranteeing member countries important trade rights. They also bind governments to keep their trade policies within agreed limits to everybody’s benefit. The agreements were negotiated and signed by governments. But their purpose is to help producers of goods and services, exporters, and importers conduct their business. The goal is to improve the welfare of the peoples of the member countries.

Source: WTO; http://www.wto.org/wto/inbrief/inbr00.htm; Nov 18, 1999

----------------------- additional answer -----------------------

The WTO is the international organization charged with enforcing a set of trade rules including the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), Trade Related Intellectual Property Measures (TRIPS), General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), among others. WTO was estab-lished in 1995 in the ”Uruguay Round”of GATT negotiations.

Prior to the Uruguay Round, GATT rules focused primarily on tariffs and quotas. Consensus of GATT members was required to enforce the rules. The Uruguay Round expanded GATT rules to cover what is known in trade jargon as “non-tariff barriers to trade.” These are food safety laws, product standards, rules on use of tax dollars, investment policy and other domestic laws that impact trade. The WTO’s rules limit what non-tariff policies countries can implement or maintain.

Source:
"A Citizen's Guide to the World Trade Organization - Everything You Need to Know to Fight for Fair Trade." [PDF - 204KB] Published by the Working Group on the WTO / MAI, July 1999.

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Citizens' Appeal

The World Trade Organization is quickly becoming the most powerful body on the planet. It plays a huge role in causing global economic insecurity.

The WTO is about to launch a New Round of Negotiations amongst its 142 member countries since the failed Round in Seattle. arliamentarians and trade representatives will soon be traveling abroad to quietly negotiate more WTO trade deals that threaten:

* the sell-off of our public services to big business
* protections for workers and basic human rights
* the environment and even democracy itself!

It's time for politicians, big business trade pushers and government negotiators to work for common security- WTO trade deals should reflect people's needs, not corporate greed. Send a message to WTO Cheerleaders to let them know they cannot represent you at the next WTO meetings and that you want them to work on our behalf to develop common security through fair trade.

Sign by Nov. 8 before the International DAY OF ACTION against the WTO on Nov. 9 and the CFWTO will deliver your message to the Canadian Government. If you have not already done so, please sign the appeal located at http://www.wtoaction.org/pledge/