The proposed Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) is seriously flawed and should be rejected, union leaders told two Congressional committees Wednesday. The pact, which does not include adequate protections for workers' freedom to form unions or safe working conditions, would not alleviate poverty in Central America and would cost thousands of U.S. workers their jobs, they said.

"Instead of improving things, CAFTA will further oppress workers, depress wages in Central America and cost jobs in the United States," AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Linda Chavez-Thompson told the House International Relations Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere. "The deal will do nothing to pull people out of poverty in Central America, and it has the potential to plunge workers further into exploitation."

Working families, along with environmental, student, religious and family farm activists, are made their voices heard on Capitol Hill Wednesday during a national CAFTA Call-In Day to stop the proposed trade deal. The call-in was part of the international Global Week of Action on Trade, April 10?16, an 80-nation mobilization to demand fair trade. Activists also will take part in hundreds of activities across the United States to spotlight the need for changes in the nation?s trade policies.

CAFTA is President George W. Bush's top trade priority. If approved, CAFTA would eliminate tariffs among the United States, the Dominican Republic and five Central American countries?Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. It would extend to Central America and the Caribbean the disastrous job loss, increasing inequality and environmental damage caused by more than a decade of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

U.S. workers lost nearly 1 million jobs due to growing trade deficits with its NAFTA partners during the past 11 years, according to the nonprofit Economic Policy Institute. During the same time, real wages in Mexico actually fell, while the number of people in poverty there has grown, according to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Since NAFTA took effect in 1994, the U.S. trade deficit with Canada and Mexico ballooned to 12 times its pre-NAFTA size, reaching $111 billion in 2004. Imports from NAFTA partners outpaced exports to them by more than $100 billion, displacing workers in industries as diverse as aircraft, autos, apparel and consumer electronics.

"CAFTA fails to remedy the fundamental weaknesses of the NAFTA model," UNITE HERE Chief Economist Mark Levinson told the Senate Finance Committee Wednesday.

Last week four House Democrats wrote acting U.S. Trade Representative Peter Allgeier saying CAFTA countries fall short of recognized international labor standards in at least 20 areas, such as workers' freedom to form unions and bargain collectively. The four ? Reps. Charles Rangel, N.Y., Benjamin Cardin, Md., Sander Levin, Mich., and Xavier Becerra, Calif., ? are senior members of the Ways and Means Committee, which will play a key role in the decision to pass or reject CAFTA.

The letter came as a new AFL-CIO report released April 4 showed the proposed CAFTA contains even weaker worker protections than previous agreements and would eliminate enforcement tools currently available in other trade programs. According to The Real Record on Workers' Rights in Central America, 40 percent of Central America's workers earn less than $2 a day, and workers' rights are routinely abused in the region.

Under Fast Track rules, Congress cannot amend trade agreements and must vote the entire treaty up or down. Congress should reject CAFTA and force the Bush administration to renegotiate the deal, Chavez-Thompson and Levinson testified. Any new CAFTA agreement should require respect for internationally recognized workers' rights, such as the freedom to form unions and to bargain collectively, they said. They also called for a trade agreement that would relieve the debt of Central American countries so they can adequately fund education, health care and infrastructure needs and reduce the financial instability caused by mounting debt burdens.

This article is reprinted from the national AFL-CIO website, www.aflcio.org

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