New from GRAIN
11 September 2006

Fighting FTAs - a workshop summary report

Fighting FTAs - a workshop summary report
Released by the Fighting FTAs workshop organising team

FIGHTING FTAS: AN INTERNATIONAL STRATEGY WORKSHOP
Organised by FTA Watch in coopration with bilaterals.org, GRAIN and Médecins Sans Frontières
Bangkok, Thailand 27-29 July 2006

SUMMARY REPORT
prepared by the workshop organising team
September 2006

In recent years, the US, Europe and other industrialised powers have been stepping up their efforts to sign bilateral free trade agreements (FTAs) and bilateral investment treaties (BITs). This increased attention to bilateral deals goes hand in hand with the deadlock in global trade talks at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). FTAs commit countries not only to accelerated liberalisation of trade in goods, such as agricultural products, but bring in new rules for trade in services, intellectual property rights, investment, etc. Negotiated outside the multilateral system, even further away from public scrutiny, they provide even greater freedom for the world's most powerful governments to push developing countries, and smaller industrialised countries, to adopt policies that are much worse than what is agreed to at the WTO.

Despite their name, these agreements are about much more than trade. They provide transnational corporations (TNCs) with vast, new, legally enforceable rights in foreign markets. Countries are being hand-picked for bilateral agreements on the basis of geopolitical concerns. Much of the FTA "chess game" today is a competition between large powers trying to secure spheres of political and economic influence. Competition between the US and the EU is a key part of that dynamic. But China, India, Japan, Brazil and others are also vying for a place in the emerging new landscape.

People's movements have been fighting FTAs ever since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed between Mexico, the US and Canada in 1993. Over the years, that fight has multiplied and grown -- from Morocco to Korea and from Ecuador to Thailand. To our knowledge, so far only one FTA negotiation process has been stopped as a result of social mobilisation and pressure. In other instances, particularly in Korea, social movements have caused significant disruptions and delays of their government's FTAs. Still, many grassroots struggles against FTAs and BITs have remained cut off from each other, a direct result of the "divide and rule" logic of bilateralism. FTA Watch, a loose coalition at the forefront of the struggle in Thailand, felt a strong desire to break this logic and share experiences with anti-FTA movements in other countries. It called on bilaterals.org, GRAIN and MSF -- all of whom had been involved in global work against FTAs and BITs for many years -- to help them organise an international strategy meeting, which was held in Bangkok on 27-29 July 2006.

This workshop brought together, for the first time, movements from many different countries which have been fighting FTAs and BITs. Participation hinged on people who have been directly involved in grassroots struggles to derail these agreements. Nearly 60 participants came from 19 countries across every time zone. Rather than attempting to set up a new network or build a common agenda, the workshop's objectives were to share people's experiences fighting FTAs in different countries and to build strategy ideas to strengthen national, regional and international struggles against FTAs.

- The full summary report is available in English at http://www.bilaterals.org/article.php3?id_article=5803
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http://www.bilaterals.org/article.php3?id_article=5803

- The Spanish and French translations will be released shortly.