Speaker: Ashenafi Argaw
SHAYNA HARRIS: It is a pleasure to be sharing with you the thoughts and wisdom of a fair trade friend who can not be with us tonight. Ashenafi Argaw and I met just a few months ago in the Oromia Coffee Farmers Union office in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. I was in Ethiopia with my colleagues visiting Oxfam's regional office and the partner organizations with whom we work. Sidama Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union, the organization that Ashenafi works with, is one of Oxfam's partners. Oxfam funds Sidama on various projects that the union identifies as important for its communities, ranging from coffee quality and processing, to clean water projects, to capacity building at the cooperative and union level.
Because Ashenafi can't be here himself, I want to give you a better sense of who he is. Ashenafi is an incredibly dynamic individual. Though our meeting was brief, I was immediately drawn to his spirit. He is a young, energetic, and incredibly committed individual.
Ashenafi graduated from Addis Ababa University and worked for one year with the government's Urban Development Office. After a year learning about how the Ethiopia government works, Ashenafi joined Furra College, determined to make a difference in the lives of Ethiopia's population by working on development issues. He completed a thesis on pricing and the coffee commodity, and through his studies became deeply convinced that generations of Ethiopia's farmers deserve more equity and dignity while pursuing their incredible work.
With what Ashenafi calls a "pressing conviction" he joined Sidama Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union and has been serving in different capacities. Currently, he is leading the export division.
With passion and commitment, Ashenafi is working to give a voice to Ethiopia's farmers, who have been silenced for too long.
ASHENAFI ARGAW: Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for this opportunity to share a message with you from Ethiopia's poor and unheard farmers.
The word "crisis" can not sufficiently describe what has happened in Africa. The human tragedy there is so serious, it sometimes defies description. According to the World Bank, the majority of African countries (about 36) have a per capita annual income less than $675. On a yearly basis, Ethiopians typically earn $110 each.
In the face of this bleak poverty, political crisis, and instability, I am happy to see that there are people who are willing and committed to help. Your presence here proves that you want to empower the downtrodden.
The marriage between fair trade and farmers has helped lessen the poverty for my people. Fair trade has saved the lives of poor farmers. And participating in fair trade requires that both buyers and growers are disciplined, honest, and fair.
One of the "Seven Sins" as Gandhi puts it was: "Commerce without morality." In this way, a fair price is a moral price. It should, however, be clear that paying this price is only part of the overall package that will transform humanity.
I believe we are all in the same boat. The circumstances might vary. But in the end, what touches one part of humanity sooner or later affects the rest.
It has been many decades since farmers started to grow coffee in our area. Coffee was originally discovered in Ethiopia in a place called Kaffe. Soon coffee was growing throughout East, West, and South, becoming a necessary source of income for many Ethiopian farmers. Coffee makes up more than 50 percent of Ethiopia's total exports, generating vital income for its population of 73 million, more than half of whom live on less than a dollar a day. But then the price slump began in 1998, and the crisis affected the country in general and the coffee producers in particular.
Sidama Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union was designed to find an alternative ways to get coffee farmers a market for their crops and a fair price that would allow them to maintain their farms and provide basic necessities for their families. Searching for new alternatives in the coffee market, the union empowered cooperatives by creating more direct relationships between the producer and the trader.
Fair trade guarantees a minimum of $1.26 per pound (a living wage) and access to credit at fair prices. These fair payments are invested in food, shelter, healthcare, education, environmental stewardship, and economic independence. Fair trade promotes socially and environmentally sustainable techniques and long-term relationships between producers, traders, and consumer.
But coffee isn't just about farmers. Coffee starts at the hands of producer and ends at the hands of consumer. As a representative of producers, I am close to the crop, where the story starts and as consumer you are close to the cup where the story ends. You get your coffee from supermarkets and I get my coffee from the farm. But the path from crop to cup, and from farm to supermarket is long, and there are many actors involved. Most of these actors are acting unfairly and affecting the lives of many poor and silenced farmers. Today, I kindly request you advocate for fair trade by preaching fair trade, and consuming fair trade.
Although I was unable to make it to your conference, I hope the message I have shared with you whets your activist appetite. I know we face a long winding path and it is mostly uphill. The tasks before us are among the hardest to perform. But I strongly believe that fairness, truth, and justice will shine through and help us win our battle. What it takes is a full commitment from us to the poor, downtrodden, and unheard farmers. Only then can we espouse the noblest ideals of humanity.
Thank you and God bless you!
SHAYNA HARRIS: Ashenafi represents the true spirit of a committed individual who is working on behalf of his country to bring true social and economic transformation to the lives of the over 80,000 farmers Sidama supports.
He is living proof that we all play an important role in the work for a more just world, regardless of where we were born, our social position, and the resources afforded to us. Like most of us here, Ashenafi was not born in a coffee growing community.
However he is an inspiration to us all, as he has found a way to use his education and privilege to form strong partnerships with the millions of coffee farmers of Ethiopia, and help bring their story to you.
To learn more about the Sidama coffee grower's cooperative you can visit Oxfam's website, at www.oxfamamerica.org. Ashenafi reminds us that we all play a role in transforming our world, in promoting a vision and enabling the notion that together, we can end poverty.
]]>The handbook also serves as a resource for high school students who are interested in learning more about Fair Trade coffee and sustainable farming. It provides an in-depth look at the social, economic, and environmental background of the coffee crisis, and describes the links between conservation and economic development. Professors can use the handbook as a learning curriculum for academic courses since it contains a comprehensive list of resources for further reading.
Oxfam America helped CAN develop this resource as part of our broader work with student-led Fair Trade organizations, such as the United Students for Fair Trade.
"Students have played an important role in raising the awareness and sales of Fair Trade coffee on college campuses across the country," said Elisa Arond, Oxfam?'s Coffee and Fair Trade Outreach Assistant. "The 'Field Study Handbook' is a great resource because it deepens students' understanding of the issues as well as their connections to coffee-growing communities."
Download a free, electronic copy of the "Field Study Handbook" and learn more about the internship program.
]]>The ICA serves as the operating charter of the ICO, the only forum that brings the majority of coffee producing and consuming countries together to address critical issues facing the coffee sector. When Oxfam launched its coffee campaign in 2002 with the Mugged: Poverty in Your Coffee Cup report, the ICO was identified as an important venue for Oxfam's message to Make Trade Fair.
The new ICA reflects Oxfam's advocacy work and puts many important issues on the ICO's agenda for the coming years. Most importantly, Oxfam's advocacy agenda came directly from a collaborative process with 12 other organizations—mostly small-scale farmer organizations—and was reflected in the paper Grounds for Change which launched Oxfam's efforts at the ICO in May, 2006.
The following points, included in the new version of the ICA, are victories for small-scale farmers and work across the world:
While the new ICA adds important elements to the ICO's mandate, the Agreement itself expresses intention. The true value of the new Agreement will be as good as the implementation, which means that while Oxfam welcomes this development it will continue to push ICO member countries to follow through on the promises made to small farmers and farmworkers. In particular, Oxfam continues to call on ICO members to create forums for small-scale farmer organizations to have direct channels to voice the challenges they face as farmers struggle to earn a decent living from their coffee crop.
At a meeting in Belo Horizonte, Brazil last week, Oxfam's coffee sector allies from several countries—including coffee cooperatives and think tanks—cautiously welcomed the new elements of the ICA. With high level attendees from the Brazilian government coffee companies in attendance, they noted the importance of continuing to work in their countries to ensure a seat at the table alongside big business interests, as well as the need to ensure fair prices for family farmers and commitment to International Labor Organization's labor standards for farm workers. With the ICA completed, the hard work of implementing reforms must now begin.
In response to the developments at the ICO, Oxfam's partners and allies committed to push for representation in their national dialogue on coffee and their delegations to the ICO in order to build on the gains we have worked with them to achieve.
The text of the ICA is available now in English. It will be made available in Spanish, Portuguese, and French on the ICO website in the near future.
]]>Today he is an independent cotton producer and the President of FONPA, the National Cotton Producers Forum, which has organized small cotton farmers to become an equal partner with government and industry in improving the lives of small scale cotton farmers of Mozambique.
"The formation of a national forum is important because for the first time cotton farmers are represented at a national level and taken seriously by government and the cotton companies. We are now able to put pressure on government, raise the concerns of the small cotton farmers, and begin to address the imbalance of power relations between the concessions and the cotton growers," said Malico. "By joining together in associations we have found it easier to negotiate a better price for our cotton and to help each other by working together to improve our production and harvesting."
On a warm winter July afternoon in his home area of Naicole, in the largest cotton producing province of Nampula, Mr. Malico is meeting with local farmers to discuss the latest harvest and their concerns and needs. Two representatives of Oxfam America's partner, ABIODES (the Organic Agriculture, Biodiversity and Sustainable Development Association) which steered the formation of FONPA, are attending to discuss a local pilot project introduced during the last season.
The pilot project provided seed, spraying equipment, training, and draft animals for plowing to 50 members of three local farmers associations. The aim was to increase the area of production and productivity, boost cotton quality and yield per hectare, and introduce sustainable agriculture.
ABIODES Field Coordinator, Isabel Mazive says the project has had a significant impact, "Fifty smallholder farmers were selected by their associations to cultivate one hectare (2.45 acres) for each producer, with a total area of 50 hectares. We estimate that the average yield per hectare will be 900 to 1200 kilos, in contrast to previous average yields of 300 to 600 kilos per hectare. Other farmers not directly participating in the initiative have also been able to hire the animal traction services at a reasonable cost determined by the associations. This income has been used to support the growth of the local associations."
Isora Jamal is one of the cotton farmers to have benefited from the pilot project. Standing in the family field surrounded by head-high cotton plants she is satisfied with this year's crop. "The animal traction has been a big help in preparing the land in time for planting and allowed me increase my area of cultivation. The training and services have definitely improved the amount and quality of my cotton. It also saved us women a lot of time and manual labor in the fields, which means we have been able to spend more time on the other food crops. The animals have also assisted with transportation and water collection," says Jamal.
The success of the project has also attracted the attention of the National Cotton Institute which now intends to extend the use of animal traction nationally. The Director of the Institute, Norberto Mahalambe, notes that the organization of the small-scale cotton farmers is vital for growth and stability in the industry. "Cotton has been one of the most stable cash crops in Mozambique for the last 100 years," he said. "There are over 350,000 cotton farmers supporting some 1.5 million dependents on this crop. Income from cotton pays school fees, medical bills and many other essential expenses."
Most of the small-scale cotton farmers in Mozambique are tied to contracts with the privatized cotton concession companies. Under this arrangement the companies provide seed in return for the cotton crop. However, the farmers complain that the inputs and services are of poor quality and many farmers end up owing the companies more than they receive in payment for their crops. This cycle of debt deepens every year. In response, FONPA is lobbying government for an agrarian policy that protects and improves the lives of cotton producers. They also want agriculture banks to finance cotton production and processing in order to improve the quality of cotton and the small farmers' income.
Oxfam America helped establish FONPA in 2005. Mahalambe, the director of the National Cotton Institute, said that Oxfam's support for FONPA "has been fundamental in assisting farmers to get organized into a national forum, able to negotiate with companies and the government. The farmers no longer stand alone and they are much more informed and capable."
Davie Malungisa, Oxfam America's trade and livelihoods expert said that FONPA is helping the farmers gain more power in determining how cotton is produced in Mozambique, but that they are looking to other activities as well. "In the coming months FONPA will focus on offering services such as access to finance, improved inputs, value addition and crop diversification," he said. The overall goal of this work: "To increased the income and food security of small cotton farmers."
]]>Oxfam responded by saying that Starbucks did prompt the National Coffee Association (NCA), of which it is a leading member, to file an opposition to the applications, which is the reason the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) gave for rejecting them. At a meeting held this past July at the Ethiopian Embassy, Embassy staff and advisers met with the NCA president to discuss a letter of protest filed against Ethiopia’s trademark applications. Ethiopian Embassy staff asked the NCA President what had prompted the NCA to file the opposition after more than year of silence on the issue. The NCA President responded that Starbucks had just brought it to the NCA's attention.
It is therefore disingenuous for Starbucks to claim they were not responsible for the application being blocked. Ethiopian Embassy staff and Ron Layton of Light Years IP, a Washington DC-based intellectual property rights organization that is helping to advise the Ethiopian government, have gone on record with this.
Starbucks has also claimed that its investment in social development projects and micro-finance initiatives in coffee growing regions has been recognized for its leadership within the industry.
While Starbucks has taken some positive initial strides in this area, Oxfam thinks the company can do better. As a company that prides itself in such efforts, it is unclear why Starbucks would oppose Ethiopia’s efforts to help its farmers realize a greater portion of the value their coffee commands on the international market.
Intellectual property ownership makes up a huge proportion of the total value of world trade but rich countries and businesses capture most of this. Ethiopia, the birthplace of coffee, and one of the poorest countries in the world, is trying to assert its rights and capture more value from its product. It should be helped, not hindered.
Oxfam continues to call on Starbucks to show leadership for other coffee companies by immediately recognizing Ethiopia's rights in this case and signing the licensing agreement that Ethiopia presented to the company in September, recognizing the country’s rightful ownership of its coffee names.
]]>The companies – Novartis, Merck and Pfizer – are resisting moves by India, Thailand and the Philippines respectively to use safeguards that are written into World Trade Organization (WTO) intellectual property rules in order to protect public health. Each company is trying to impose its patent monopoly on a big-selling medicine to stop the countries from exercising their rights to trade in cheaper generic equivalents.
"The industry is fighting hard because developing country markets, especially in Asia, are vital for its future growth and these medicines under dispute are so valuable," said Celine Charveriat, head of Oxfam's Make Trade Fair campaign. "These disputes put monopolies and profits over public health, which is exactly what world leaders promised would never be allowed to happen under WTO intellectual property rules."
Pharmaceutical sales across the world's four biggest emerging markets, including India, grew by 22.3% in 2005 compared to single digit growth in the US, Europe and Japan. Of the medicines in dispute, Novartis' anti-blood-cancer drug Glivec is worth $2.1 billion in annual sales and its patent begins to expire in 2013. Pfizer's hypertension drug Norvasc is worth $4.7 billion in annual sales and it wants to extend its patent that has already begun to expire in some countries.
In a statement prepared for Oxfam, Constant Gardner author John le Carre said yesterday:
"Here is what I wrote five years ago in the Afterword to The Constant Gardener: 'As my journey through the pharmaceutical jungle progressed, I came to realize that, by comparison with the reality, my story was as tame as a holiday postcard.' The reality today is worse. By imposing one-to-one deals on individual governments, Big Pharma is dishonoring hard-won international agreements designed to allow lifesaving generic drugs to be produced and marketed in countries where there is urgent and demonstrable need. The present posture of Novartis in India is a classic example of Big Pharma's unbeautiful priorities. With unlimited legal resources Novartis is challenging India's sovereign right under international law to supply cheap, non-patented drugs in situations where the public health is at risk. If the case succeeds, Novartis will have protected the health of its account books at the expense of those who will die because they can't afford the drugs that could save them. "
"Since India is the main supplier of inexpensive medicines to the developing world, a victory for Novartis will also curtail access to affordable medicines in Africa and Asia," Charveriat said. "These three disputes show that the intellectual property system cannot work to protect public health if companies can continue to undermine developing countries from using legitimate health safeguards. In two cases, we have a legal battleground where poor people are losing out to vested interests."
Some companies, including Merck and Novartis, say they can discount prices or donate medicines to poor patients instead. Oxfam says that this is not the long-term solution to sustainable access to affordable medicines and does not cover all patients who need them.
"Donations can help poor people in specific situations, such as disease eradication programs,' said Charveriat. "However, discount programs keep all decisions about who can get medicines and for how long in the hands of the companies. A sustainable and proven way to get affordable medicines to people is by generic competition."
"The Philippines, Thailand and India have taken important steps to use public health safeguards to reduce the price of medicines and respond to serious public health problems. They should not be bullied when rightfully applying these rules," Charveriat said. "We applaud their efforts. They should remain strong against this corporate pressure and the companies should drop their lawsuits and their objections."
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According to Oxfam, the agreement includes strict new intellectual property rules that would extend corporate monopoly rights and dangerously hinder Colombians' access to important life-saving drugs. Colombia’s health insurance system today falls short of providing adequate access to medicines, with 20 million Colombians unable to afford the medicines they need. If this FTA is implemented, Colombia's health care system would be forced to spend an additional $900 million a year to cover the increased cost of medicines by year 2020, leaving it unable to meet existing coverage, much less expand it.
"Agreements between trading partners should offer economic opportunity and development, not the demise of a poor country's public health system," said Stephanie Burgos, trade policy advisor for Oxfam. “Unfortunately, this agreement locks in unfair trade rules that pull the rug from underneath Colombia’s poor.”
The agreement will also expose Colombia’s farmers to unfair dumping of agricultural products, forcing them to compete with subsidized exports from the United States. This could spell economic disaster for the millions of people in Colombia who depend on agriculture for their livelihood, according to the organization.
"This free trade deal will pry open Colombia's market without consideration of the damaging effects of dumped, cheap, subsidized American products,” said Burgos. “Poor farmers need viable alternatives to growing coca, but US dumping of rice and corn could undermine their livelihoods and leave them with no other option.”
The FTA will have to be approved by Congress in both the US and Colombia, but opposition has been mounting, including in the US Congress. Congresswoman Linda Sánchez (D-CA) is traveling to Colombia next week to meet with civil society organizations and Colombian legislators to discuss the possible negative consequences of the trade deal.
"The Colombia FTA is a bad deal for American and Colombian working families," said Congresswoman Sánchez, "This deal will gut Colombia's farming industry and continue this Administration's practice of exporting American manufacturing jobs."
Oxfam called on the US Congress to reject the Colombia FTA and others like it, and focus its energies on extending current trade preference legislation instead. This includes the Andean Trade Preferences Act, which provides duty-free access to the US market for specific products from designated developing countries such as Colombia. Current programs are set to expire at the end of the year but Congress will consider renewing those preferences after it returns on December 4th.
"The US Congress should put a stop to free trade agreements like the one with Colombia because they threaten development priorities in poor countries," said Burgos. "The US Congress should instead encourage developing countries to utilize trade as a means of achieving sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction by extending and strengthening existing trade preference programs.”
]]>The declaration states that developing countries must be able to use public health safeguards written into the World Trade Organization's (WTO) intellectual property rules (called TRIPS) in order to access cheaper generic versions of patented medicines. Generic competition is the most sustainable way to keep the price of medicines down, according to Oxfam.
"Rich countries have broken the spirit of the Doha Declaration," said Celine Charveriat, head of Oxfam's Make Trade Fair campaign. "The declaration said the right things but needed political action to work. That hasn't happened. We've gone backwards. People are still suffering or dying needlessly."
Since 2001 things have become worse for sick people in developing countries:
According to the World Health Organization, 74 percent of AIDS medicines are still under monopoly, 77 percent of Africans still have no access to AIDS treatment, and 30 percent of the world's population still does not have regular access to essential medicines.
At the same time, rich countries, especially the US, are bullying developing countries to impose stricter intellectual property rules in order to preserve pharmaceutical monopolies. This is restricting generic competition and keeping prices high.
"Global health statistics are grim but the US continues to negotiate trade deals with stricter rules that limit how a country can use public health safeguards," said Charveriat. If implemented, these deals will result in Colombia having to pay an additional $940 million per year by 2020 to cover the increased cost of medicines, affecting nearly 6 million patients. Similarly in Peru, the price of medicines could increase by 100 percent in 10 years and 162 percent in 18 years.
Other rich countries, particularly those among the European Union, have quietly consented to US actions. Pharmaceutical companies have gone even further by directly challenging countries such as India and in Philippines that have sought to use the safeguards.
In 2005, cancer patient groups in India used Indian intellectual property law to stop a patent application by the Swiss company Novartis for its anti-cancer drug, Glivec. This allowed Indian companies to continue making generic versions at $2,700 per patient a year, as opposed to Novartis having a monopoly priced version for sale at $27,000 per patient a year.
However Novartis recently appealed the court's decision in a direct challenge to India's right to interpret the TRIPS Agreement to protect public health. If Novartis is successful, it could jeopardize India's generic export industry. India is the world's leading exporter of generic medicines, with 67 percent of its exports going to developing countries.
"Novartis has told Oxfam that there is no commercial market for Glivec in India and that it is challenging India in order to align Indian intellectual property law with TRIPS," Charveriat says. "However, India is only trying to use the flexibilities rightfully available to it under TRIPS and Novartis is seeking to block that right."
Meanwhile in the Philippines, the government has conducted tests and issued regulatory approval for a cheaper patented version of Norvasc, a heart disease drug now under patent to the US company Pfizer. The government is doing this to ensure that a cheaper patented version of Norvasc that costs almost 90% less will be available immediately from when the patent expires in June 2007.
Oxfam believes that the government's action is consistent with the TRIPS Agreement and with the Philippines intellectual property law. However, Pfizer is now suing the government. If Pfizer is successful, it will severely limit the government's ability to access cheaper medicines and assert its right to enforce TRIPS safeguards.
"Developing countries have a responsibility to use the public health safeguards but when they try to do so they are put under huge pressure," Charveriat said.
In order to make the Doha Declaration work, Oxfam is calling for:
"Rich countries must live up to their commitments and stop undermining the Doha Declaration with their selfish actions," Charveriat said. "Now more than ever we need a global trading system that puts health before profit and makes medicines affordable for all."
]]>The bill would extend for one year an expiring provision of the African Growth & Opportunity Act that enables apparel manufacturers in least-developed countries in Africa to use fabric from any country. This would encourage apparel companies to continue sourcing from sub-Saharan Africa, which is vital to preserving the jobs of thousands of workers, mainly women, who lack other economic alternatives. However, after October 1, 2008, apparel manufacturers would be required to switch to a stricter rule that requires at least 50 percent African-content (such as fabric and labor), gradually increasing to 60-percent by 2015. While Africa’s existing cut and sew operations could make up a certain percentage of the value-added requirement, the bulk would need to come from the new production of fabric in Africa.
“This temporary extension is critical today to ensure that the jobs upon which thousands of women depend for their livelihoods do not disappear tomorrow,” said Oxfam America President Raymond C. Offenheiser. “But we are concerned that this proposal could set the bar too high in too short of a time period for the struggling African apparel sector. Building up a viable textile and apparel industry takes many years and huge amounts of capital.”
The bill would also provide tax incentives to companies that invest in sub-Saharan Africa in sectors other than extractive industries and include Haiti into the grouping of developing countries that receive apparel benefits.
“Tax incentives to encourage companies to invest in sub-Saharan Africa are a welcome addition to the US’ development strategy for Africa.” said Offenheiser. “Extending duty-free benefits for Haitian apparel is a positive step, but we should simplify the rules to encourage sourcing from the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.”
The bill also proposes a two year extension of the Generalized System of Preferences, which provides duty-free benefits for many products to over 100 countries. However, new restrictions would exclude certain sectors in India and Brazil from duty-free treatment.
“The continuation of duty-free programs like GSP provides the vital opportunity for developing countries to use trade as a way of achieving sustained economic growth and poverty reduction.” said Offenheiser. “But the exclusion of some developing countries from the GSP program is troubling, given the millions of poor people who are employed in sectors that directly benefit from duty-free benefits.”
]]>The ICO is in the midst of renewing its operating charter, the International Coffee Agreement (ICA). Oxfam and other groups representing small-scale family coffee farmers say that the renewed charter will be vital in helping to level the playing field for millions of poor farming families around the world whose livelihoods are being destroyed because they can’t compete in the global market due to unequal terms.
As its September meetings begin today, the ICO will have an opportunity to consider recommendations from coffee producing and consuming countries that emphasize the need to create a more sustainable coffee sector.
“A more sustainable coffee supply chain benefits everyone in it –from the largest roasters to the 25 million small-scale coffee farmers and farmworkers struggling every day to make a living,” said Seth Petchers, the coffee lead for Oxfam’s Make Trade Fair campaign. “The ICO is hearing this message from member countries- now it’s time for action.”
The ICO is the only dedicated forum for discussing coffee-related matters at the international level, bringing together coffee-producing and consuming countries around one table. It could be the focal point for international cooperation to bring about a truly sustainable coffee economy.
World coffee prices plummeted in 1999, devastating coffee farming communities around the world. Despite recent improvements, the price continues to fluctuate and the crisis for coffee farmers persists. To make matters worse, they don’t have enough access to credit and information to plan and market their crops.
A paper released this year by Oxfam International and twelve allies (see below for full list) called Grounds for Change: Creating a Voice for Small Coffee Farmers and Farmworkers with the Next International Coffee Agreement, recommends the ICO:
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create systems so that all parties, including farmers, have access to relevant coffee sector information;
and facilitate coordinated, well-resourced responses to the crucial issues facing small-scale farmers including: technical assistance, risk management and access to credit.
To read Grounds for Change, please visit: www.maketradefair.org/ico.
]]>According to Oxfam, the agreement, entitled US-Peru Trade Promotion Agreement, does not take into account the economic and social disparities between the two trading partners and fails to realize the potential benefits of trade as an engine for development and poverty reduction.
“The Peru free trade deal will harm thousands of Peru’s small farmers, limit access to affordable new medicines by unduly extending the monopoly rights of the international pharmaceutical industry and will restrict Peru’s ability to regulate foreign investment to ensure it serves national development, said Stephanie Weinberg, trade policy advisor for Oxfam America.
Although outgoing Peruvian president Alejandro Toledo has touted the benefits of the agreement which was approved by its lame-duck Congress, there is deep concern among much of Peru’s population about the effects of the agreement, with a broad cross-sections of civil society actively questioning the trade agreement.
"With three quarters of the rural population of Peru living in poverty, it would be irresponsible to expose our small farmers to unfair trade because of American agricultural subsidies,” Guillermo Rebosio with the National Convention of Peruvian Agriculture, who came to Washington to meet with Members of Congress. “Peruvians deserve a trade agreement with development and equity at its heart, supporting efforts to strengthen democracy and successful anti-drug policies, but this agreement will do the opposite, by threatening the income of Peruvian farmers, who will be forced to compete with highly subsidized American products like cotton, corn and wheat.”
While the Peru FTA fails to take into account that the effect of US agricultural subsidies would have on Peru's small farmers, it also undermines public health efforts in the country by restricting generic competition, which will increase prices for new medicines in Peru. This will have a serious impact on half of the Peruvian population that does not have health insurance and will severely strain the already overburdened public health system.
“Peru has nothing to gain and a lot to lose from the harsh intellectual property provisions imposed by the US in this free trade agreement that far surpass currently accepted global standards already in effect in Peru,” said Roberto Lopez, director of Health Action International in Peru. “As a result, the price of new medicines will increase dramatically, with the Health Ministry estimating that in each of the first five years the agreement is in effect, 700,000 Peruvians will be unable to afford the medicines they need.”
“With the Doha Round now on ice, the US seems poised to continue negotiating harmful bilateral trade agreements that exacerbate existing inequities by forcing developing countries to make deeper concessions, while gaining less than they would at the WTO,” continued Weinberg. “No matter the spin, this free-trade agreement will stifle opportunities for development and should be rejected.”
]]>Concern and anger over unfair world trade rules and harmful EU and US trade policies will only intensify following this week’s breakdown in negotiations. “The Doha round has opened people’s eyes to the fact that world trade could help millions of poor farmers and workers, but rich country farm policies are working directly against that,” said Celine Charveriat of Oxfam’s Make Trade Fair campaign.
The EU and US farm policies are now wholly discredited and it is widely recognized that they must be reformed. Even with talks on ice, their harmful agricultural subsidies are vulnerable to a suite of legal challenges just as significant as Brazil’s successful cases on cotton and sugar.
The two trading blocs will also face considerable opposition if they try to pry open developing country markets by negotiating harmful bilateral and regional free trade agreements. “The EU and the US must make amends by changing their mindset and begin meaningful reforms for development,” she said.
The Backlash of Failure
The indefinite suspension of the talks means that the chances of a deal in the immediate term is unlikely because of upcoming elections in key countries and the expiry next year of the US administration’s authority to negotiate a deal.
“This is a huge blow for millions of poor people, for instance cotton farmers who are struggling to make a living. If talks take years to complete, the entire West African cotton sector could be wiped out,” Charveriat said. Oxfam says that the Doha suspension will:
The Doha round was primarily initiated in order to correct the rigged rules that allow rich countries to capture nearly 70% of world trade flows worth $20.6 trillion, while poor and developing countries representing 81% of the world’s people – many of them living in extreme poverty – got 30%. The entire continent of Africa got just 2.6%.
“These trade talks were about fostering equitable economic growth in all countries. This is in the long-term interests of everyone, especially the US and EU. However, for the past five years, both have behaved as if the Doha development round was a sacrifice for them to make,” Charveriat said.
The suspension of the Doha round could mean that the international community has lost the only diplomatic option to influence upcoming reforms of the US Farm Bill and the EU common agricultural policy through negotiation.
But the option of litigation is still open because Oxfam says the EU and the US are violating existing WTO rules. Oxfam believes that $13bn worth of present-day EU and US subsidies are illegal. Countries such as Chile, Costa Rica, Argentina, Kenya, Peru, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Egypt, Thailand and Nigeria among others could bring solid cases on rice, corn, sorghum, milk, butter, tobacco, fruit and tomato subsidies. “This is just the tip of the iceberg,” Charveriat said.
Oxfam also sees a danger that the EU and the US will turn to bilateral trade agreements to get what developing countries refused to give them at the WTO: unfettered market access and intellectual property and investment rules that are damaging to development.
Why the Talks Failed
The EU and US failed to see that times had changed since the Uruguay Round and that developing countries are now key players. “Developing countries were clear about what they need from the round. They showed real strength of unity in refusing to allow development to disappear from the agenda, which would have happened had they accepted the EU and the US offers,” Charveriat said.
There is also a growing public awareness about the unfairness of current world trade rules: an Oxfam petition calling for fair trade rules has 20 million signatures of citizens around the world and many more NGOs, farmers organizations, unions, workers and social movements mobilized against the current approach to trade negotiations.
National politics poisoned the Doha talks. The US Congress refused to give its negotiators the room to make meaningful reductions in US agricultural support. The EU was similarly hostage to its member states, for example France and Ireland, who refused to make meaningful reductions to its farm tariffs. “It is academic whether one was worse than the other. In the final weeks the US would not budge, but the EU is no less to blame by its earlier intransigence.”
Poorer countries were expected to cut farm tariffs too steeply, despite the risk to millions of subsistence farmers. They were put under pressure to give up their ability to protect their food security and policies to fight rural poverty.
In negotiations to open up industrial markets, rich countries tried to push through a deal whereby developing countries would have had to slash their tariffs by more than twice as much as rich countries. “Developing countries were asked put jobs and industrialization under threat for the privilege of rich countries reforming their illegal agricultural policies – reforms that they had promised to make years before. This was trade negotiation at its most surreal.”
A Roadmap Out
Oxfam is looking to the EU and the US to make amends. Irrespective of when talks restart, rich countries must end dumping – not only by ending export subsidies but by ending all trade-distorting subsidies that lead to dumping, especially on cotton. “The EU and US will lose all credibility if they take this suspension of trade talks as an excuse not to reform their Farm Bill and CAP,” she said. “Developing countries will refuse to come back to the table to discuss cutting their tariffs if the EU and the US are still dumping.”
“The cost of delay is too big and the potential for development too great for these talks to be left to wither on the vine,” Charveriat said. However, restarting the talks would be difficult if rich countries continue to deny developing countries the right to use the available flexibilities as they liberalize their markets, at their own pace and scale. “The EU and the US must not try to question the development mandate of the talks and ignore the fact that there is extreme poverty in most developing countries,” she said.
“The poorest countries of the world must not be made victims of this failure that is not their fault.” The least-developed countries should be given full 100% duty-free quota-free access to rich country markets. This must also include reforming the “rules of origin” that allow rich countries to use other means, for example overly burdensome health and safety, to exclude poor country exports.
The EU and the US must agree to a meaningful aid-for-trade, made up of new money and with no strings attached. “There is no excuse for this package to suspended along with the Doha talks,” she said.
]]>New legislation introduced by Rep. Charles Rangel in the House of Representatives and Sen. Max Baucus in the Senate would extend a critical provision of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) that allows for flexibility in determining which clothing products qualify for duty-free treatment. These bills would help encourage apparel companies to continue sourcing from sub-Saharan Africa, which is vital to preserving the jobs of thousands of workers, mainly women, who lack other economic alternatives.
“While a longer-term solution is needed to promote the apparel sector in sub-Saharan Africa, we need urgent action today to ensure that the jobs upon which thousands of women depend for their livelihoods do not disappear tomorrow,” said Oxfam America President Raymond C. Offenheiser.
“Broader reforms are imperative in the near future so that more people in Africa can take advantage of AGOA,” said Offenheiser. “However, emergency legislation is critical to ensuring that the gains already made under AGOA are not lost.”
In addition, the bills would extend for two years the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) and the Andean Trade Preference Act (ATPA), which provide duty-free benefits to many developing countries.
“The continuation of duty-free programs like GSP and ATPA provides the vital opportunity for developing countries to utilize trade as a way of achieving sustained economic growth and poverty reduction,” said Offenheiser.
]]>Earlier this month, Ethiopian farmer cooperatives, coffee exporters, and government officials met with American and Canadian coffee companies in Long Beach, California to talk more about the trademark and licensing initiative.
The historic meeting at the Specialty Coffee Association of America conference represented the next stage in dialogue between Ethiopians and North American roasters, which started in Addis Ababa this February. There, roasters committed to help bring their peers to the table and Ethiopians agreed to begin building the program's infrastructure. Much was accomplished in just three short months. Getachew Mengiste, director of the Ethiopian Intellectual Property Office, told a standing-room-only crowd in Long Beach about recently completed training workshops for staff from embassies, farmer cooperatives, and exporting companies.
Ethiopia launched its coffee trademark and licensing initiative to give farmers more control over their world renowned coffee brands, strengthen farmers' negotiating position, and ultimately help them capture a greater share of their coffee's value. At the conference in Long Beach, the Ethiopians used their time with roasters to discuss the best ways to work together to put the program's "nuts and bolts" into place.
"We are working together for a common cause," said Mengiste as he opened the gathering. "This initiative should meet the interests of farmers to ensure that they get benefits from their fine coffee. The interests of our roaster partners should also be met. The whole idea behind this initiative is to connect our coffee farmers with the roasters."
Attendees agreed on the key points for discussion, which included ways that the coffee brands would be used on packages and labeling, joint marketing promotion strategies, guaranteeing quality, and expanding the network of participating roasters. Tadesse Meskela, manager of Oxfam partner, the Oromia Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union, opened the floor for discussion. As he stood in front of the room, Meskela thanked all of the participants and gave special acknowledgement to the roasters who have already committed to the project by signing a licensing agreement.
For two hours, participants discussed ideas, challenges, and opportunities for moving the trademarking initiative forward. The spirit of the conversation was collaborative with roasters giving the Ethiopians many points to consider when they return home and begin implementation. Participants took on a shared sense of responsibility for carrying out their individual roles in the process. As Dean Cycon, owner of Dean's Beans Organic Coffee Company, one of the most recent companies to sign a licensing agreement with Ethiopia, said, "Whatever we're creating together we want to protect."
It will take a lot of hard work to ensure that the trademarking and licensing initiative creates real change for Ethiopia's poor coffee farmers. But the second meeting of Ethiopian stakeholders and North American roasters ended with participants ready to take up the challenge.
"We have said that the farmers have the right to own their coffee brands," said Ashenafi Argaw of the Sidama Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union. "Now all of the stakeholders need to work very hard together to bring them the benefits."
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