INTERNATIONAL CONFEDERATION OF FREE TRADE UNIONS (ICFTU)
Brussels May 03 2001 (ICFTU OnLine): Assisting developing countries to withstand the negative pressures of WTO agreements, the setting up of a formal structure to address core labour standards, and clear limits to the current negotiations on trade in services. These measures are part of a statement adopted by the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), providing labour's input to the discussions underway today in Geneva, and continuing over the coming months, to determine the agenda of the WTO's 4th Ministerial Conference due in Qatar in November 2001.
The Brussels-based labour group argues in its statement that "little of substance has changed since Seattle to indicate that any of the underlying reasons for the failure of the 3rd WTO Conference have changed. Governments and their trade negotiators must heed the lessons of Seattle if they are to regain public confidence in the multilateral trading system."
"A full assessment of the economic, social, labour, gender, environmental and developmental impact of previous WTO negotiations and the potential impact of any further negotiations is needed. The member states of WTO must break out from the present status quo", says ICFTU General Secretary, Bill Jordan.
The ICFTU statement draws on the experience of Seattle and elsewhere to propose a reorientation of the multilateral trading system to promote sustainable world economic growth and development. On public services, the government must retain the right to keep main services as education, health, water and postal service in the public sector, and the GATS agreement, the ICFTU continues, should explicitly guarantee this liberty of action for both present and future governments. The WTO's members must make an explicit undertaking to protect social services that are provided or regulated by the government from the need to liberalise or open to market access.
The WTO should draw lessons from the controversy in Seattle provoked by that WTO meeting's failure to address developing countries' concerns. Democratic reforms are needed to ensure that all WTO members (particularly the least developed) are able to take part fully in all WTO activities and procedures. Supporting development priorities, the ICFTU calls for more operational WTO provisions for special and differential treatment, to enable those countries to have increased flexibility. It calls for assistance to developing countries so they can withstand business pressures to introduce patent laws that preclude socially responsible actions under the TRIPS intellectual property agreement.
The ICFTU statement further stresses the long-standing WTO issue of core labour standards, one which has been gaining in support ever since Seattle, such as in Quebec City last month at the Summit of the Americas, where leaders of the western hemisphere discussed the possibility of creating a free trade zone for the region.
"The urgency of the need for labour standards to be respected at the WTO is shown by the number of export processing zones that has all but doubled in just five years while China, a huge country that systematically violates fundamental workers' rights, is generally expected to become a member of the WTO in the near future. It is therefore a priority to protect the fundamental rights of workers in developing countries and elsewhere against unscrupulous governments or employers who seek to gain an unfair advantage in international trade through the violation of core labour standards", the statement argues.
"Seattle was a watershed in the short lifetime of the WTO, marking a crisis in the legitimacy of the multilateral trading system", concluded Bill Jordan. "Failing to heed its message can only reduce the WTO's credibility and legitimacy among the general public, and intensify the backlash against globalisation."
For the full statement please click on: http://www.icftu.org/displaydocument.asp?DocType=Statements&Index=991212665&Language=EN
For more information, please contact the ICFTU Press Department on +32 2 224 0232 or +32 476 62 10 18.
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