FTAA Talks Fail Again!

Dear Friends,

The most recent attempt at resuscitating the ailing FTAA talks have, for a
third time in a row, ended in failure for the negotiators - and a striking
victory for people struggling against corporate globalization across the
hemisphere. Below please find the statement from the Continental Campaign
Against the FTAA and an article from the Miami Herald about the future
prospects of the FTAA. We are one giant step closer to putting the final
nail in the coffin of this attempt to privatize the continent.

Thank you for all your efforts to STOP the FTAA,
Global Exchange

Buenos Aires, 1 April 2004

3:00 pm

FTAA: Puebla Talks Suspended Again

The second day of the informal negotiating meeting on the FTAA in Buenos
Aires has just ended. Once again, the negotiators from the Mercosur and the
United States, Canada, Mexico, Ecuador, Chile and Costa Rica did not reach
an agreement and decided to postpone the continuation of the TNC meeting
planned for the end of April in Puebla.

There are still no dates or time periods set for the continuation of the
negotiations. The co-presidents (Brazil and the United States) will have to
circulate a bracketed draft for comments from the delegations that were not
in Buenos Aires (they still have not finished that text). All of the
delegations will consult with their foreign ministries to receive new
negotiating instructions.

The problematic contents are structurally the same as before: additional
provisions; agriculture; services; and intellectual property (as we
explained in the previous report). The text that the negotiators were
working on now has more brackets than it did before the meetings, which
shows the difficulties of reaching an agreement. The probability that the
number of brackets will increase is very high since, when the text was
circulated, other countries (especially Bolivia, Venezuela and CARICOM, who
made proposals that were not considered) added new paragraphs.

In services, one highlight is the inclusion, proposed by the Mercosur, of a
paragraph that urges all countries to improve their offers on this issue.
The proposal, still in brackets, points to obtaining some offer from the
United States on market access for agricultural goods. On this point M.
Redrado stated that while there is no agreement, they achieved greater
"understanding" of the agricultural issue in the sense that if domestic
support is not eliminated, there would have to be compensation, such as, for
example, immediate tariff cuts on other products. This sets off alarm bells
as it reveals the Mercosur's intention to reach some agreement.

The Chilean delegation in Buenos Aires has just signed the statement on
demise of the FTAA.

For our part, the struggle continues on all fronts against free trade. This
is especially true for the fronts on which the battle presents the
conditions of greatest asymmetry, as in the case of the bilateral agreements
under negotiation.

Autoconvocatoria No al ALCA (Argentina)

Campanha Brasilera contra el ALCA

Alianza Social Continental

Campaña Continental Contra el ALCA

Thanks to Karen Hansen-Kuhn of the Development GAP for the above translation
from Spanish.

***************************************************

FTAA '05 deadline in jeopardy

Negotiators fail for third time this year to end an impasse for talks
aimed at creating a Free Trade Area of the Americas.

BY JANE BUSSEY

jbussey [at] herald.com

TRADE

Efforts to revive the stalled negotiations for a Free Trade Area of the
Americas failed for the third time in two months Thursday, jeopardizing
the year-end deadline for completing an agreement for a 34-nation
trading bloc.

In a sign of deepening discord, regional trade officials ended informal
talks in Buenos Aires without agreeing on a date for the next round of
negotiations.

Progress on fleshing out the details of blueprint for free trade that
was worked out in November in Miami has been slow.

Deputy trade ministers were at an impasse after the 17th round of the
Trade Negotiating Committee in Puebla, Mexico, in early February. A
mini-meeting in Buenos Aires in early March also ended without agreement
but with a pledge to reconvene all the deputy trade ministers in Puebla
April 22-23.

Now that meeting has been pushed into the future, possibly some time in
May.

''Further progress is necessary before resuming the 17th meeting of the
TNC,'' said a statement from the U.S. and Brazilian co-chairs of the
informal Buenos Aires talks.

''Obviously we would have liked to have completed our work at this
meeting,'' said Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Peter Allgeier in a
conference call with reporters. ``It is proving more difficult.''

The latest stalemate prompted questions about how negotiators could
meet the talks deadline.

''They can't,'' said Peter Morici, a University of Maryland business
professor who was involved with the North American Free Trade Agreement
and ratification of the World Trade Organization.

Morici said the framework thrashed out during the Miami meeting has
proved to be ''unworkable,'' especially in the light of the upcoming
presidential election in the United States and Brazil's reluctance to
open its markets to industrial imports.

''Given the deep deadlock between blocs of countries with opposing
views of what an FTAA should be, it is amazing that the Bush
administration still insists that the FTAA is alive,'' said Lori
Wallach, a free-trade opponent and director of Public Citizen's Global
Trade Watch in Washington.

''Pull the plug on the comatose FTAA and start over with rules aimed at
pulling up wages and environmental and consumer standards in the
hemisphere,'' Wallach said in a statement.

The top U.S. trade negotiator acknowledged the difficulties in setting
the ground rules for talks, but Allgeier said it was up to trade
ministers to alter the deadline if it proves unworkable.

''The timetable of completing these negotiations by [January] 2005 is
one that has been set by our leaders and reaffirmed by our ministers,''
said Allgeier. ``We have to work within this framework unless there is
some change.''

Negotiators from the United States, Canada, Mexico, Chile, the four
South American Mercosur countries -- Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and
Uruguay -- and Ecuador met Wednesday and Thursday in the Argentine
capital in hopes of ending a deadlock over agriculture and market access
for other products, among other issues.

The Mercosur countries are demanding an end to U.S. price supports and
other farm subsidies, political hot potatoes even in a nonelection year.
Brazil, on the other hand, has dug in its heels over broadening legal
rights of foreign corporations in Brazil and access to services and
government contracts.



--
Deborah James, Global Economy Director
Global Exchange
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415.255.7498 fax
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