Lawyers for the National Roundtable on Metalic Mining in El Salvador reacted to the initial hearing, saying that the proceedings ignored the essential role of local communities in determining whether mining projects can or should go forward, and the environmental risks associated with such projects.

Pacific Rim applied for the operating license in 2005 to open a mining project in the department of Cabañas, in the north of the country. It is suing for losses incurred on investments made during exploration work. Pacific Rim filed the suit based on the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), specifically chapter 10 on investments and chapter 12 on dispute resolution.

The economic and investment focus of the dispute was heavily criticized by Luis López, a lawyer for the National Roundtable on Metalic Mining in El Salvador. "Environmental issues and the rights of the local communities are not being discussed," he says. "This operating license is being treated as just another permit, without taking into account the fact that this country is very small and densely populated, and those issues [the environment and people’s rights] will only be addressed as secondary issues."

That is why the Roundtable, with the support of Oxfam America and the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) will be sending an 'amicus curiae'-- a friend of the court brief-- to the ICSID. This is a way for organizations and people directly affected to get involved in a case of this kind, between a transnational company and a government. "With the 'amicus curiae' we're going to introduce new elements that will have to be taken into account, such as the environmental issue" says López. "We want all aspects of the dispute to be discussed."

A second hearing is scheduled for August, when both parties will produce further evidence to support their positions. The dispute is expected to be settled in August or September of this year.

"Resuscitating Doha is essential to right the rigged rules of trade, but what's been simmering on the WTO stove will simply not deliver for poor countries, said Oxfam America president Raymond C. Offenheiser. "The financial crisis, which started in developed countries but is taking its worst toll on developing countries, should be the impetus for a change in course."

In a new report released today called "Empty Promises," Oxfam details how the Doha Round has become an exercise in prying open developing country markets rather than an effort to rebalance decades of unfair agricultural and industrial trade rules. In the midst of a global economic crisis, a food crisis, and a climate crisis, nations with the least blame and with the least capacity to cope with the consequent effects must not have to pay even more to enable their economies to develop, according to the report.

Over 50 million people stand to lose their jobs, remittances are collapsing, and growth in sub-Saharan Africa is predicted to fall by 70 percent this year trapping 90 million more people in poverty, because of the crisis. Food prices meanwhile remain high for poor consumers: by the end of 2008 a further 109 million people had been added to the ranks of hungry, topping 1 billion people worldwide. As the world experiences the sharpest drop in trade in 80 years, a "development" trade deal—as originally promised—remains crucial, according to Oxfam.

"Now is the time for WTO members to come back to the negotiating table, recognize that the current crisis provides an opportunity to address urgent development needs, and change the course of negotiations, much as they did nearly eight years ago in Doha," said Offenheiser. "At this time of desperate need for a change of course, the Doha Round has to step up to deliver on its development promise. There is little credit left for another failure."

The welcome political commitment from the G8 could lead to a fresh start to negotiations, but it cannot be business as usual. In the past eight years, developed countries have used the talks to continue to push to open up new export markets. Developing countries have resisted, saying they were promised a deal that would give them space to protect their farmers and new industries, an end to rich country trade-distorting agricultural subsidies, and more access to rich markets for their farmers and industries.

The widespread food price crisis has shown that food and livelihood security cannot depend solely on market forces. Development, rather than liberalization, has to be the central objective of negotiations and trade rules must respond to the needs of the most vulnerable people first and foremost, according to Oxfam. It is the responsibility of WTO member states to analyze the role of trade in the recent global crises so that the Doha negotiations take into account the new global context and contribute to a solution, rather than exacerbate the problem.

"What's on the table is no silver bullet since it continues to favor the richest and biggest farmers and industrialists in the US and Europe and sidelines the needs of the poor," said Offenheiser. "We have seen what can be done when countries find the resolve to avert problems at home, and this resolve must be translated to the multilateral trade agenda so that the much-needed conclusion of the Doha Round can be achieved in a manner that addresses developing country needs first and foremost."

"One part was washed out by the landslides," cooperative member Lucas Izapo told us. "Before Stan, the land was thick with coffee plants, everything was covered with coffee plants. When the landslide came, it took the coffee bushes with it. The hill was left bald, and covered in rock.

"Now I am fixing up my land, little by little. But it's not going to take a year to fix it, it'll take three, four, or more years before this part is back to normal. Because it isn't easy to build walls. This year I planted living fences with Yucca and Bower Vine. And little by little I am going to make a stone wall, to protect the coffee from the rain that falls [each winter]."

The cooperative was able to support its members with the donation of new coffee plants to replace the older ones, organic fertilizer, and $62 for each member. They needed to make this investment to care for the plants they still had left.

They cooperative also repaired the channel that drains the coffee washing stations. This was essential to renew their fair trade certification; without this certification their income would drop even more.

Like other places in Guatemala, farmers in Solola lost much of their corn. Lucas said it has been difficult to feed his family of 10.

"I had to work even harder to sustain us, because I didn't have my harvest which was lost the year before. I lost 160 to 200 pounds from that corn harvest. So I had to plant tomato and onion and sell it to buy the corn that I used to grow for myself. Little by little I was able to buy the corn—100 pounds, another 100 pounds—because I grew these other crops."

Recovering the coffee crop is not a quick endeavor. In the majority of cases it will be three or four years until the harvest is at its normal level. And cleaning up the destroyed plots of land also takes time. It is an additional task that the coffee growers had to undertake in the moments when they weren't tending to the crops spared by the storm.

The first cooperative we visited was ASUVIM, in the province of Quetzaltenango, where we spoke with the president of the cooperative, Daniel Balux. The principle problem this cooperative faced was that nearly 30 percent of its harvest was affected by black bean, a deformation of the coffee bean that cannot be seen when the coffee is harvested, but only once it is dried. It changes the color and the taste of the coffee, disqualifying it from the gourmet and fair trade markets.

Can you tell us about the black bean problem?

Actually, we detected it here at the mill. We saw that we had black beans, but we didn't think it was so extensive, we thought it was just the first beans. But as we continued with the harvest it was the same. It was the whole harvest. The coffee looked good as parchment coffee but if we look at them all—the ones with a different color, they are black beans. We can't say that our members brought in bad coffee, because the cherries looked good, they didn't even look a little rotten or anything like that. The coffee was good. You can't say to the people, look, bring us better coffee or chose it better—[but] of course when they cup this coffee the cuppers will say it is green coffee, coffee that didn't reach its full maturity. So the aid for the black bean was something necessary [to compensate for the low price]. So, what did we do after all this? Well, thanks to the help that came from you, at least the members got their normal price. At least we could say to them, 'Look, the coffee was shipped at this price, but we are going to help you a little bit and we are going to pay you this much.' The people saw that at least there was an effort behind all this."

In addition to this monetary compensation that was given to the members, what other actions did ASUVIM take to overcome the crisis?

Here 60 percent of what people earn comes from coffee. If there are problems with the coffee, there are problems in the families. Either there is little schooling, or people are unable to complete projects they had planned or there isn't much food. Here in ASUVIM we also helped out with corn. We gave each member 800 pounds of corn. Part of it we donated, the other part the members had to buy. Each family of six consumes about 1,600 pounds of corn per year. [They lost 80 percent of the harvest.] What happened with the 20 percent that they were left with? They ate it in January, maybe into February, but by March they had to buy corn. Then the problem is that when there is high demand for corn, the price rises. So we helped them with this, with 800 pounds. We think it's 50 percent of the corn they eat, we could now say that at least they had corn to eat.

The other damage we suffered as an organization is related to the landslide here next to the patio where we sun dry the coffee. With the rain, little by little, we were losing more of it. So we were faced with an emergency. Either we did something or our patio would collapse. And the more time that passed, the worse it was. So we received aid from Oxfam America because the construction is big. But it was necessary because if we lose the patio, it'd be an additional expense.. We are still constructing, but we are making the wall. We aren't doing something that is simply going to fall apart next year and then we would have to invest in it all over again. We want to invest, to spend and if that means chipping in ourselves, we do it.

With the US looking to increase trade with Africa and Asia as well, Oxfam and its partners knew the negotiations around DR-CAFTA would set the stage for the US free trade agenda.

"In the US, this was a symbolic vote and symbolic debate. It was about much more than US trade with these Central American countries," Weinberg said. "For Oxfam and others, it was important to draw the line in the sand to say 'stop negotiating trade rules that fail poor people.' Our message to the US Congress and administration is 'get back to the negotiating table at the World Trade Organization to ensure a meaningful outcome that addresses key concerns for development.'"

The campaign operated on several levels. In Central America, civil society groups largely barred from democratic processes worked hard to open up avenues of debate with their government representatives negotiating the agreement. They also carried out grassroots education campaigns and mobilized people from across their countries to pressure their governments to stop DR-CAFTA.

At the same time, Oxfam sponsored delegations from all six Latin American countries that are party to the agreement.

Ten groups—made up of economists, small-scale farmers, generic drug company representatives, women's rights activists, environmentalists and former elected officials—came to Washington, DC, between 2003 and 2005 to speak directly with Congress members and their staff.

"It was an education for many in the US Congress, as well as a capacity building exercise for those who participated, because the people who came up learned a lot about how the US Congress and political system functions," Weinberg said.

At the same time, elected officials in the US learned about the reality on the ground in Central America, which provided a different story than the ones they constantly heard from Central American ministers and ambassadors. In one example, Oxfam America helped facilitate visits by rice farmers from Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic last April. They met with 20 different undecided members of Congress and their staff, and helped them hear directly from farming communities vulnerable to low-priced imports from the US. Congressman Sherrod Brown (D-OH) and his staff heard this message about rice, and issued a statement to his colleagues in Congress explaining the potential for unfair trade.

"While Central American countries will be forced to eliminate import tariffs on rice, the United States will continue to maintain generous subsidies for domestic rice producers. The US produces $850 million in rice each year, but subsidizes the industry to the tune of $1.3 billion; $450 million over the market price. These artificial supports lead to dumping on the international market, distorting trade. Huge agri-business reaps the profits, as 20 percent of US rice producers receive 85 percent of price support revenues," the statement read.

"Central American rice producers face an uncertain and bleak future with an imminent flood of unfair imports."

Then there was the way DR-CAFTA was negotiated. The US insisted that the entire agreement be developed in just one year, and that the Central American countries negotiate as a bloc. This was an ambitious request, and asked a lot of countries which had little capacity to negotiate trade agreements with an economic superpower.

As DR-CAFTA was being negotiated, the countries in the region had few meaningful democratic traditions in place. The poorest and least politically connected members of society were unable to influence the negotiations. And with elite business interests dominating the input to trade ministries, DR-CAFTA was less likely to really help the poor farmers and others who really needed to experience the benefits of increased trade.

"Most of the region's organized poor were skeptical that a free trade agreement with the United States could in any way help improve their situation," said Thea Gelbspan, Oxfam America's Program Manager for Latin America. "DR-CAFTA ignored the rural poverty so many Central American farmers live with, and its claims to guarantee economic growth for the region weren't backed up by the policies it contains."

To address this concern, Oxfam America gave grant funding to a coalition of economic research and advocacy organizations working to inform the public about the details of the agreement, and seek meaningful participation by all members of society. Called "Iniciativa CID," the group included organizations in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.

Members of Iniciativa CID carried out research projects to inform legislators about the concerns of farmers and low-wage workers, provided training to farmers and farm workers about the DR-CAFTA proposal, and helped bring together citizens and their elected representatives to discuss international trade and poverty.

"The rules of the game really need to be changed... as well as the content of the agreements," said Rene Rivera, an economist at El Salvador's National Foundation for Development.

DR-CAFTA is a regional trade agreement between the US and Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic. If approved, the agreement would further open Central American economies to US exports and foreign investors. It would reduce local decision-making and fail to ensure international labor and environmental standards.

With Oxfam's support, representatives from El Salvador's FUNDE, Guatemala's CIDECA and Nicaragua's Centro Humboldt met with US Congresspeople and their staff.

Oxfam provides grants to the Central American partners, which lobby against DR-CAFTA and educate citizens about the consequences of the trade agreement, if ratified.

"Oxfam has allowed us to do a lot of research. And Oxfam has been instrumental in helping us come to the US to say, 'We really don't want CAFTA,' face-to-face," said Mario Rodriguez, 40, an economist specializing in intellectual property with CIDECA.

It's important for US citizens to lobby their Congressional representatives to make trade fair. But it also makes a big difference when Central American civil society representatives can speak directly to the US Congress to explain how their countries' development will be affected, said Stephanie Weinberg, Oxfam America policy advisor.

In addition to providing direct support to the Central American groups, Oxfam America also fosters connections between US farmers and farmers in other countries around policy debates like CAFTA. Working with US partners such as the National Family Farm Coalition, Oxfam has funded exchanges where American farmers from the National Family Farm Coalition meet with farmers in Mexico and Central America, and vice versa, with Mexican farmers touring US farms.

The exchanges help farmers from the North and South understand each other's situation and make tangible connections, farmer to farmer, about the impacts of agricultural and trade policies on their daily lives.

"My ability to explain to my fellow farmers why we should help didn't come naturally," said George Naylor, president of NFFC and a farmer from Iowa. "Meeting with farmers from other countries helped me understand."

After hearing the stories from the Central American and Mexican farmers he met, Naylor said he realized that CAFTA would further depress prices abroad and push more farmers off their land.

Any farmer can understand that threat.

"When everybody in the family ends up working off the farm, then what you used to think of as a 'family farm'—where everyone is involved in caring for the land and producing food—can't happen anymore," Naylor said.

How would you describe Oxfam's partnership with Centro Humboldt?

I believe there are interests that we share that are very important to the work we do in Nicaragua—natural disaster preparedness work, extractive industries, and irrigation issues.

Oxfam also helps build campaign support, political understanding and meaningful participation.

What are you doing in your country to try to defeat DR-CAFTA?

We have firsthand information about what's going on with CAFTA. We are trying to provide that information to those people who don't have access to it.

We are influencing public opinion and pressuring the government to prevent the agreement from being ratified in the countries throughout Central America.

At the international level, we are trying to convince members of Congress who are undecided that CAFTA is not the thing to do.

What aspect of the DR-CAFTA agreement are you most concerned about?

CAFTA will have very serious consequences on the Central American environment. Even though there is a chapter on the environment in the agreement, it is not enough to mitigate the negative effects CAFTA will produce if approved.

The intellectual property rights provisions will allow exploitation of all the local environmental capital that Central America has. This chapter will just benefit big corporations at the expense of local companies and communities.

The big corporations will tap the genetic information in tropical forests and use it for their own needs. In this agreement, foreign investors will benefit to the detriment of local businesses in Central America.

Biodiversity is an area in which Central America is very rich. And those resources are at risk under CAFTA.

Another major problem for the environment is genetically modified organisms. US agriculture allows the use of these kinds of products without a problem. If CAFTA takes effect, increased trade will bring these products to Central America. Right now, these genetically engineered products don't exist in Central America. This would lead to contamination of the local resources.

We don't know what type of problems these new seeds will introduce. We don't know what consequences there will be.

Describe the different levels at which you work on CAFTA in Nicaragua.

After the agreement was negotiated, the nature of the activities changed. We moved from a phase where we constructed proposals to a second stage, which involved getting information to the people about what had been negotiated.

What kind of reception have you received during your visit?

I believe that the US Congress is near a decision. It will be very tight, a very close call. So, this is a very important time. This is the time to influence the decision.

We still have to wait for the final result, but we have provided them with important information so they can make an informed decision.

How would you describe Oxfam's partnership with CIDECA?

Oxfam has allowed us to do a lot of research. And Oxfam has been instrumental in helping us come to the US to say, "We really don't want CAFTA," face-to-face.

Why should people in the US care about DR-CAFTA and its affects on your country?

We believe that public opinion has been manipulated. The business sector, which is pushing CAFTA, has said that people in Central America want CAFTA. The reality is totally different

For example, in El Salvador, this agreement was approved late at night and behind closed doors. In Honduras, when they approved it, the legislature had to leave through the back door because there were protestors out front. In Guatemala, the people are asking for a national referendum even though the president says they can't afford it.

We believe that this is an important decision for the future of our countries. There has to be a national referendum so people can say what they think.

I believe that the negotiations and ratification process is totally undemocratic—because the negotiations have been carried out, and still are being carried out, by a very small group of people. We have asked the Congressional representatives in Guatemala if they understand the agreement. And they say they don't even have a copy to look at. But they have been pressured to vote in favor of CAFTA. That's not democratic and says a lot about the process.

If CAFTA really is a good thing, why do they have to hide negotiations and do it behind the people's back?

Today, we got news that the Guatemalan congress was trying to approve DR-CAFTA. What have you heard?

I got news of the police repressing local people who were protesting against CAFTA. I don't think CAFTA has been approved yet, but it can happen at any moment.  (Guatamala's congress ratified CAFTA on March 10, 2005. The agreement is awaiting ratification by the US congress).

What is your organization doing to defeat DR-CAFTA?

We lobby the Guatemalan congress. At the national level, we are part of Mesa Global, which has been leading the protests this week. We also present proposals and research on issues related to the negotiation process and the potential impact of the trade agreement. We have been working with people involved in the negotiations and ratification of CAFTA, as well as with local organizations.

How do you feel about your visit here?

I'm very sad because I feel that the future, whatever it is, will be decided here in the US. They don't have the right to make decisions about our lives.

The discussions on the future of the International Coffee Agreement present an historic opportunity to address the ongoing crisis facing smallholder coffee farmers and farmworkers by contributing to sustainable coffee supply chains. At the 2nd World Coffee Conference in September 2005 several organizations presented the International Coffee Organisation and its delegates with the Carta de Salvador—the Salvador Declaration, which stressed the ongoing effects of the coffee crisis facing small-scale family farmers and farmworkers. This paper calls on International Coffee Organization members to support small-scale farmers and farmworker organizations by ensuring space for their direct participation in international debate, creating mechanisms that enhance the availability of market information to small-scale farmers, and maximizing opportunities to develop cohesive international strategies to provide technical support, access to credit, and direct access to markets.

But I'm luckier than most. Just as the shortest, coldest days of winter hit Boston, the coffee cherries in Central America and Ethiopia begin reaching their peak red color. That's when I get to do my favorite work—visiting with Oxfam's coffee partners in Guatemala, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Ethiopia. Each coffee harvest, I reconnect with the farmers who Oxfam America campaigns for back home.

Whenever I visit with coffee farmers and explain that I've come to learn more about their lives I'm always greeted warmly. These visits get me motivated, although, if truth be told, the visits aren't always uplifting.

This harvest I visited a farmers' cooperative in southern Ethiopia. Though I was welcomed by a group of 15 farmers and their families, the conversation was grim. The coop had fallen on hard times. Though the world price of coffee was up, the families I met were struggling to make it on $300 a year. In two hours there wasn't a single smile on anyone's face and I drove away struggling to imagine how these people were going to make it.

Just a few weeks ago I returned from Guatemala. The volcanic mountains surrounding Lake Atitlan create some of the best coffee-growing conditions in the world. Yet last October the farmers I met with saw Hurricane Stan wash enough mud and boulders down from these mountains to cover houses and wipe out coffee farms. I met people who lost it all and found myself struck by the fact that these farmers—people who were already struggling to get by—were struggling even harder this year because they were on the wrong side of geographic circumstance.

But both in Ethiopia and Guatemala I was amazed to find—as I always do—something inspiring. This harvest, my favorite experience was a walk with Don Antonio Cavajay Ixtamer, president of the cooperative La Voz que Clama en el Desierto (the voice that cries out in the desert). Antonio took my colleagues and me on a walk through his coffee farm where Antonio estimates 80 percent of his land was damaged. We saw coffee trees buried in infertile silt and stumps marking the places where healthy coffee trees once stood.

At the far end of Antonio's farm we emerged from the trees left standing into an area that looked like a dry river bed covered with boulders, some larger than Antonio. He explained that this area had been covered with coffee trees but was inundated with rocks and mud that slid down the mountain during Stan.

It was hard to fathom the force that was required to do such damage to the farm and I asked Antonio if he would ever be able to recover the land. Without missing a beat, Antonio replied "Si se puede. Si se puede." (Yes we can. Yes we can.), and proceeded to explain how he and his sons would remove the rocks, fill trenches, and build stone barriers to divert water before the rainy season begins in May.

Antonio hopes to have the recoverable portions of his land replanted within three years. I don't know whether he'll be successful, but if he falls short, it won't be for lack of motivation and hard work.

Some won't be successful—I know that. But so many of the coffee farmers I meet share the same spirit as Antonio that I've returned to Boston inspired and ready to do what I can to support them. As a result of my trip, Oxfam will provide farmers with $100,000 they can use to help rebuild after Stan.

Despite all the challenges I see, there are farmers who don't give up. As long as they're willing to fight, then I'm willing to fight, too. Some wins are big, some incremental, and sometimes we don't win at all. But as long as Antonio and other coffee farmers are saying "Si se puede" then "Si se puede" it is for me, as well. Yes we can. We have to.

Only after many months of intense lobbying efforts by the White House involving backroom deal-making and partisan pressure was the agreement passed in the House of Representatives by two votes. "In forcing passage of an unpopular trade agreement, the administration chose to ignore widespread concerns raised by many members of Congress and their constituents, as well as by farmers, trade unions, and church and community groups in the US, Central America and the Dominican Republic," stated Stephanie Weinberg, trade policy advisor with Oxfam America. "Whatever the spin, DR-CAFTA will institutionalize an uneven playing field instead of establishing fair and equitable rules for trade."

Although the White House portrayed a vote for DR-CAFTA as a show of support for democracy and development in the region and as promoting US national security, this doesn’t face up to the facts. Widespread citizen opposition to DR-CAFTA in Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic continues to delay congressional consideration of the agreement in those countries, while strong protests accompanied the process of ratification in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras, where military forces were called in to quell the mounting opposition.

"Development and democratic processes are being undermined through DR-CAFTA," continued Weinberg. "The Bush administration bullied Central American governments into signing on to a bad agreement that will have serious repercussions for those who are already disadvantaged in these highly unequal societies where most of the poor live in rural areas, rely on income from agriculture, and must pay for medicines out-of-pocket."

DR-CAFTA rigs the rules in favor of the interests of transnational companies. While the agreement provides virtually no new US market access to developing countries (with the limited exception of textiles), it extends monopoly rights for international pharmaceutical companies, thereby limiting marketing of generic medicines, and prohibits governments from using policy tools designed to ensure that investment provides maximum benefit to local communities. Furthermore, DR-CAFTA requires these developing countries to open their markets to the dumping of US rice and other commodities and to forbid use of adequate safeguards to ensure food and livelihood security and rural development. DR-CAFTA also blatantly ignores the fact that US agribusiness receives extensive subsidies and domestic supports, estimated to be around $24 billion this year alone, making it impossible for Central American and Dominican farmers to compete.

"Rather than setting out provisions that will foster broad-based economic growth and sustainable development, DR-CAFTA will put millions of poor people at risk of losing their livelihood in Central America and the Dominican Republic, and creates further pressure on people to migrate to cities or to the United States," said Weinberg. "The rules set forth in DR-CAFTA on agriculture, intellectual property, and investment add up to a bad deal for farmers, workers, and consumers in these developing countries."

Implementation is likely to continue to be contested in the region, since many aspects of DR-CAFTA will force legislative changes that will erode the policy space required for national development. "Although trade could be an important engine for development and poverty reduction, the trade rules under DR-CAFTA will become one more obstacle to achieving this goal in Central America and the Dominican Republic," Weinberg added.

Groups like the National Family Farm Coalition, the Federation of Southern Cooperatives, the Missouri Rural Crisis Center, and Rural Coalition, carried out direct advocacy of their own, telling their elected officials that trade agreements should protect food sovereignty, not threaten it. Just as the Central Americans wanted to avoid the US flooding their surplus commodities into their market, small-scale American farmers wanted their government to pursue policies that supported them, not the huge agriculture corporations that would benefit from DR-CAFTA.

"This agreement is absolutely horrible for us livestock producers," said Rhonda Perry, a farmer and head of Oxfam partner, Missouri Rural Crisis Center. "It's also not beneficial for farmers in the DR-CAFTA countries. All these promises about export markets, clearly, that's not what happens. There are a few multinational corporations that have no allegiance that make out like bandits. The rest of us are stuck picking up the pieces."

Oxfam America created opportunities for Central and North American farmers to meet, learn from each other, and work together to oppose unfair trade. The National Family Farm Coalition worked with members of Iniciativa CID in Washington, DC to help them bring their concerns directly to members of Congress and share perspectives, farmer to farmer.

"This was really a united front even though people were coming at it from different angles. It was a chance to develop shared understanding about CAFTA's negative impacts on farmer livelihoods in both the US and Central America," said Jaeda Harmon, a US Regional Office Program Officer at Oxfam America