“Courage is a muscle – the more you use it, the stronger it gets,” declared Rodolfo Robles, a Guatemalan labor leader who survived years of death threats for his organizing. To all the good people who are hopping mad about the US Congress' approval of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), Rolfo would say, keep organizing. We need your energy. The incredibly close CAFTA vote proves we are gaining power to shape global trade, and the struggle continues at the World Trade Organization (WTO).

The CAFTA struggle builds our energy for globalizing a trade system based on human rights instead of profit. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is the principal forum where corporations demand the ability to overturn social protections, patent native knowledge, and undermine democratic decisions to insure profits. With the WTO holding another ministerial meeting in Hong Kong on December 13th 2005, it’s time to transfer our CAFTA energy to derailing this process in the WTO. Meanwhile, we need to continue the creative process of developing new trade systems to meet human needs.

As the WTO’s General Council meets in Geneva this week, the global farmers’ network Via Campesina and supportive organizations unveiled their framework for an agricultural trade system based on the concept of food sovereignty. Food sovereignty emphasizes small-scale farmers’ access to the land, seeds, water, credit, and technology they need to produce food, and access to markets to sell it. The framework proposes to stabilize food prices at levels that cover the farmers’ costs of production – a key step to reducing rural poverty. Read the full statement at http://www.peoplesfoodsovereignty.org/crisis-eng.html.

During the last WTO ministerial meeting in Cancún, Via Campesina organized major street protests during which the Korean farmer Mr. Lee Kyung-Hae sacrificed his life, wearing a sign reading “WTO Kills Farmers.” Mr. Lee’s desperation is shared by farmers world wide. Ironically, low food prices contribute to the fact that 50% of hungry people in the world are small-scale farmers. Low prices force farmers off their land. Treaties such as CAFTA and the WTO’s Agreement on Agriculture drive agricultural prices lower by preventing nations from taking action to stabilize food prices. Meanwhile, major food trading, processing, and marketing corporations benefit from these lower prices without passing the savings to consumers. “Champagne corks were popped in the executive suites of ADM, Cargill, and Con Agra when CAFTA passed,” stated George Naylor, President of the National Family Farm Coalition, a Via Campesina affiliate which organized farmer opposition to CAFTA in the United States.

One lesson of the difficult passage of CAFTA through the US Congress and the stalled agricultural talks in the WTO is that small-scale farmer organizations are successfully challenging the lobbying might of major food corporations. Citizen pressure from sugar farmers in the United States played a key role in securing the 216 opposing votes against CAFTA in the House of Representatives. Meanwhile, pressure from Via Campesina is contributing to breakdown in agricultural negotiations in the WTO.

Via Campesina’s vision to coordinate the development of new agricultural trade regimes demonstrates a long-term commitment that transcends temporary setbacks such as CAFTA. After all, corporations and trade systems are simply forms of human organization, and are not fixed in stone. They can and will be changed. For those who opposed CAFTA, there is an urgent, creative task at hand to build a global trade system that works for all of us.

Kirsten Schwind is Program Director at the Institute for Food and Development Policy, also known as Food First. Food First is a member of Via Campesina’s Food Sovereignty Network. Contact kschwind@foodfirst.org, or see www.foodfirst.org. For the statement “WTO in Crisis; Groups Offer Alternative Plan to Protect People’s Food Sovereignty” issued by Via Campesina and 36 supporting organizations including Food First, see: http://www.peoplesfoodsovereignty.org/crisis-eng.html

© 2005 Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy

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