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]]>On Dec. 12, the eve of the World Trade Organization's week-longMinisterial meeting, a delegation of celebrities including Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal, singer Angelique Kidjou, from Benin, and Chinese rockstar Anthony Wong handed over the petition to Pascal Lamy, Director General of the WTO.
The group of celebrities reflect the diverse originsof Big Noise signatures, which have poured in from around the world, with large numbers coming from developing countries such as India, Ethiopia, Bangladesh, and Zambia.
Rich countries have made a significant contribution as well. Through a variety of grassroots methods, in almost every state in the country, Oxfam America helped gather about 220,000 signatures within the US.
Organizers in California, Kansas, Chicago, Virginia, and Boston gathered signatures as part of their work promoting a cap on US agriculture subsidies, which could help reduce poverty for millions of small-scale farmers.
About 1,000 volunteers gathered signatures while talking with audience members at Coldplay, REM, Youssou N'Dour and Habib Koité concerts, and conferences and expos such as the Green Festival and Fair Trade Futures conference.
Student activists at universities around the country, including Oxfam America-trained CHANGE leaders established fair trade clubs on their campuses, participated in a traveling fair trade Road Show, and staged talks and teach-ins this fall and during the Global Week of Action in April.
And roughly 85,000 online activists signed up to the Big Noise, either by logging onto www.maketradefair.com and through e-mail actions from Oxfam.
These efforts supported trade campaigns around the world.
Just this month, actor Colin Firth met with European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson in Brussels. He, along with Oxfam campaigners and a Chinese dragon, reminded the commissioner of the upcoming World Trade Organization meeting in Hong Kong, where development represents a key issue on the agenda. More than 70 journalists turned up for the event.
Firth said: "What is an actor doing here? There are millions of people more qualified than me—the 10 million names on the Big Noise petition ... I'm here as a name, a European, and a consumer. These are the voices I give to Mr. Mandelson to take to Hong Kong."
And in West Africa, where small-scale farmers have been devastated by US overproduction of cotton crops, campaigners reported gathering more than 2.7 million signatures for the Big Noise—an extraordinary achievement.
Oxfam will keep a steady drumbeat going throughout the WTO meeting Dec. 13 to 18.
"For millions of people, trade is a life or death issue. This is the first opportunity many have been given to voice their concerns," said Brian Rawson, Trade Campaign Organizer at Oxfam America.
The Make Trade Fair team also plans on presenting the petition to US decision-makers gathered in Hong Kong.
"The delivery of the Big Noise in Hong Kong will bring the collective power of these voices right into the negotiating halls of the WTO."
]]>Big international meetings like this are huge undertakings and almost always take on a feeling of a many-ringed circus. There are many side shows and a dizzying array of strange and interesting events.
But at the center of it all, remains an important focus: the world's governments have come together to negotiate trade rules. Rich countries and poor countries, big and small, have gathered to see if they can hammer out a new global trade agreement.
This "round" of negotiations was launched four years ago in Doha, Qatar—hence it's called the "Doha Round." The explicit purpose of the negotiations was to help developing countries gain more from the global trading system. Currently, trade is dominated by rich countries. Less than 20 percent of the world's population captures 80 percent of the world's trade. The poorest countries get the least.
Oxfam's mission in Hong Kong is to make sure that the needs of poor people are heard, and that the negotiations reform fundamental inequities in the rules. My job is to try to lobby US officials, talk to US media, and coordinate with our friends from other organizations and activist groups. It’s a lot to manage.
Luckily for me, we have good hosts. Oxfam Hong Kong is doing an extraordinarily good job. As one of the most prominent nonprofit groups in Hong Kong—in fact in all of China—they have a very important role. They are taking the message of Make Trade Fair to the streets of Hong Kong, talking to citizens, teaching, and listening. They have even taken out billboard space on Hong Kong's sparkling subway system
Today we are learning that negotiators are preparing a "development package" of agreements that would help the poorest countries. This is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, these countries really need help. On the other hand, the negotiation will be a failure for development if rich countries can package some small concessions and sell it, rather than undertaking a much deeper reform, particularly of agriculture trade rules. More on that next time.
Must go to bed now. Tomorrow we're expecting to see Oxfam's familiar "big heads"—gigantic fiberglass masks of the leaders of the eight richest countries in the world—doing a fun stunt with some surprise celebrity guests. Also the trade justice movement will stage a large rally and march through the streets of Hong Kong. The negotiations will formally start. And I'll be speaking on a panel on food aid. So the show begins...
]]>Amid cheers from a throng of enthusiastic supporters and international media, Make Trade Fair won the day.
Oxfam's trade campaign was launched.
Within hours of the Hong Kong debut, events were held in 25 cities including Brussels, Dublin, Geneva, Mexico City, San Salvador, and Washington, D.C. These events ranged from press conferences and symposiums to a rock concert in London’s Trafalgar Square.
Oxfam's trade campaign seeks to unite concerned citizens around the world in calling for fair trade policies that will help move millions of people out of poverty.
Nobel Prize Professor Amartya Sen, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, and musician and social activist Bono were among those who endorsed the campaign. "Oxfam has got it right," said Bono. "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."
Also in this issue of EXCHANGE, writers Frances and Anna Lappé discuss their book Hope's Edge: The Next Diet for a Small Planet, and we bring you updates on Oxfam's work with water and sanitation, drought in Ethiopia, and indigenous women in the highlands of Peru who are speaking out after decades of violence.
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