Women Say "No" to the WTO:
A MADRE Statement on the Sixth Ministerial Meeting of the World Trade Organization

December 2005

The WTO's December 2005 meeting in Hong Kong came at a moment when proponents of the WTO's neoliberal economic model are on the defensive. It appears that a critical mass of developing countries' governments and global civil society organizations have reached the conclusion long held by MADRE and others concerned about economic justice and women's human rights: the WTO's mandate of liberalizing global trade has worsened poverty, income inequality, displacement, and cultural and environmental destruction around the world. A look at the three main issues under discussion in Hong Kong- agriculture, services, and "non-agricultural market access" (NAMA in WTO-speak)-reveal that women are particularly threatened by the policies that wealthy nations are pushing at the WTO.

Agriculture: In this set of talks, the US and EU are trying to maintain subsidies for their large-scale farmers-currently at $350 billion a year or five times the amount rich countries spend on foreign aid-while refusing to allow developing countries to subsidize their own farmers. Millions of small farmers in poor countries have already been bankrupted by this flagrant double standard because they cannot compete with subsidized imports from the Global North. The majority of these farmers are women, who grow most of the world's food. The WTO is also pushing small farmers to shift from growing staple crops-such as corn, rice, and wheat-which comprise up to 90 percent of the food for the rural poor, to growing cash crops for export. The shift to export crops threatens women's livelihoods and social status because cash crops are usually controlled by men-and, increasingly, by large-scale agribusiness. The shift also threatens food security for women and their families, as women have less time and less land to grow food.

Services: According to the WTO, everything is a tradable commodity, even vital services such as water delivery, health care, and education. In Hong Kong, rich countries are pushing to expand corporate ownership (or "privatize") services. Privatization usually means rate increases that make basic services unaffordable to the poor, most of whom are women. Privatization also increases women's work burden; when services such as health care or potable water are no longer provided by the government, women must meet their families' needs for those services at the household level.

NAMA: In this set of negotiations, rich countries are trying to get poor countries to lower tariffs on industrial products and natural resources. Tariffs work like a tax on foreign corporations' profit, providing developing countries with an important source of revenue. Without that money, governments will be even more hard-pressed to provide their people with schools, clinics, decent housing, electricity, and other basic services that women, in particular, rely on.

By robbing developing countries of sources of revenue and the freedom to determine their own economic and development policies, rich countries at the WTO make a mockery of their stated commitments to fighting poverty and promoting development through initiatives such as the UN Millennium Development Goals. Today, the WTO's claim that neoliberal economics is the only option for economic growth is being challenged. MADRE and other civil society organizations worldwide have articulated viable alternatives for regulating trade in ways that benefit-rather than harm-women, families, communities, and the environment. Together with our sister organizations in Colombia, Cuba, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Mexico, Peru, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Sri Lanka, Iraq, and Palestine, MADRE calls for new global trade rules that:

1. Are negotiated through democratic processes with effective participation from communities that will be impacted, including women's organizations.
2. Ensure that life-sustaining resources such as water, food staples, and medicinal plants are guaranteed to all people and not reduced to commodities.
3. Ensure that access to basic services, including health care, housing, education, and sanitation is recognized as a human right that governments are obligated-and empowered-to protect.
4. Institute the highest, rather than lowest, standards for labor rights and health, safety, and environmental protections.
5. Adopt principles of "fair trade" including social security and development assistance programs that protect small farmers and workers and recognize the value of women's unpaid labor in the household.
6. Require foreign investors to contribute to the economic development of the communities where they have a presence.
7. Promote policies that respect local cultures and collective Indigenous rights and preserve traditional agricultural techniques and biodiversity in food crops and nature.
8. Recognize the links between economic growth and ensuring peace and human security.