OXFAM Releases Global Trade Report; Targets 'Fast Track' As Unfair To Poor People; U2 Singer/Activist Bono Endorses Report On Web Site

4/11/2002

From: Deborah Rephan, 202-496-1303; 202-276-1995 or Peggy Connolly, 617-320-7681, both of Oxfam America

WASHINGTON, April 11 -- International aid agency Oxfam today called on the U.S. Congress to defeat the Trade Promotion (or "fast track") Authority bill, and released a report, "Rigged Rules and Double Standards: Trade, Globalization, and the Fight Against Poverty." The report details how the current international trading system allows countries like the United States to manipulate trade rules, robbing poor countries of $100 billion a year, and denying millions of people the chance to escape poverty.

The report provides recommendations and comprehensive details on how trade rules can be reformed to bring economic prosperity to millions. In one powerful example, the Oxfam research shows that increasing exports from Africa by just one percent would lift 60 million people out of poverty.

"The problem isn't that global trade rules are inherently against the needs and interests of the poor. The problem is that the rules are rigged in favor of the rich and powerful," said Oxfam America's President Raymond C. Offenheiser. "Right now we have a system that lets poor countries with 40 percent of the world's population to get only $3 from every $100 generated by trade."

As Oxfam launches it campaign for fair trade rules, its first effort in Washington is opposing Trade Promotion Authority for the President. Oxfam believes the so-called fast track legislation is an exclusionary trade practice that favors the rich and powerful at the expense of workers and consumers.

"Fast track authority is the antithesis of the open and fair global trading system we hope to achieve, and which is crucial to making trade a meaningful tool for poverty reduction, " said Oxfam's Offenheiser.

Oxfam was joined by a U.S. and a Mexican worker who have experienced the harsh realities of unfair global trade rules.

"The government said the maquiladoras would bring many jobs, but they never told us about the pollution, health problems, and terrible working conditions they'd bring," said Ana Delia Caldera Rocha, a labor organizer in who works at a local Sara Lee textiles factory, part of the same company known mainly in the United States for its packaged cakes and snacks. "Mexican workers are routinely harassed or fired for standing up for our rights in the maquiladoras."

Edward Jackson, a retired Ford Motor Company worker and member of the Tennessee Industrial Renewal Network, participated in an exchange with workers in Juarez on the U.S.-Mexico border. "American and Mexican workers have more in common than many people think," Jackson said. "We've both been hurt by NAFTA and other bad trade deals, we both want good jobs based in our own communities, and we want our rights to be respected."

As part of its global campaign, Oxfam today also launches an interactive Web site www.maketradefair.com that will allow people around the world to participate in an exciting new kind of online activism called "The Big Noise."

One of the first supporters to provide their support to the campaign is singer/activist Bono of the group U2, who in a statement today said: "Oxfam has got it right. It wouldn't cost much to change the rules of trade so that poor countries can work their way out of poverty. But the world's leaders won't act unless they hear enough people telling them. And every day they fail to act, thousands of people die because they can't afford the basics of survival. That's why I'm adding my voice to The Big Noise."