In just a few days, the world's trade ministers will be gathering in Seattle for the Ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organization (WTO). What is the environmental agenda of the U.S. for this meeting? Vice President Gore announced this week that the U.S. would promote, in the future, an environmental assessment of the impact of trade agreements. Gore also mentioned fisheries subsidies, agriculture, and environmental technology. But Gore said nothing about forests. Nothing about forests, either, in the remarks of a State Department official last week in Portland OR, on the issue of the WTO and the environment.
The reason the Administration does not want to talk about forests and the WTO is that a major part of their Seattle agenda is a wood products agreement. Every national environmental group opposes this proposal, called "Advanced Tariff Liberalization (ATL)," which could also eventually include "non tariff" measures, too. In response to our concerns, the Administration has put forward nothing, absolutely nothing to mitigate the impact of the ATL -- not even a flimsy environmental "side agreement" like they used to dress up NAFTA.
The Administration's defense of their proposal, when asked, is that they did a study concluding that the impact of wood products tariff elimination on forests would be minimal. This study, however, has not convinced the timber companies. A press release from the American Forest and Paper Association (AF&PA) says that the wood products agreement is the "last opportunity" for the U.S. logging industry to "operate on a level playing field internationally." The Seattle WTO meeting is "critical" for the logging industry, they say.
In fact, the Administration's ATL study shows that there is a lot to be concerned about. The study concludes that the ATL will increase logging in Chile, Indonesia and Malaysia, home to some of the world's most endangered and biologically rich forests. And the Administration questions why we call their plan the "global free logging agreement?" Perhaps as important is that the study doesn't attempt to assess the specific impacts on forests and biodiversity in Indonesia, Malaysia, Chile, or elsewhere. How could it? The study was finished just a few days ago.
The WTO presents a lot to be concerned about. But just looking at forests, it is embarrassing that our government's agenda is to promote more logging in some the world's most sensitive forests and not feel responsibility to propose any mitigation at all. Even Home Depot recognizes that some sensitive forests shouldn't be logged. How ironic: Home Depot acts to reduce their negative impact on the forests of Indonesia and Malaysia, while the U.S. government is pushing more logging in these same forests. Shame on you, Uncle Sam.
There's not a lot of time, but it's not too late to remedy this injustice. This week, write an Op Ed to your local paper based on this alert. Then, on Tuesday, November 23, please call the Vice President's office at 202/456-2326 to ask for forest protections at the WTO. Thanks.
Steve Holmer
Campaign Coordinator
American Lands
726 7th Street SE
Washington, D.C. 20003
202/547-9105
202/547-9213 fax
wafcdc@americanlands.org
www.americanlands.org
What is the Free Trade Area of the Americas? The Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) is a free trade and investment agreement being negotiated between the governments of North, Central and South America and the Caribbean. It is modeled after the North American Free Agreement (NAFTA) between North America, Canada and Mexico.
Negotiations are scheduled for completion in 2005. However, negotiators claim to be ahead of schedule and expect that a draft text will be completed by the end of this year. Presidential candidates George Bush and Al Gore have expressed plans to push swiftly ahead with the FTAA upon taking office.
The goal of the FTAA is to create a free trade and investment zone that extends from northern Canada to the southern tip of Chile. As with NAFTA, "free trade and investment" means reducing government regulations on corporations, opening markets to foreign competition and expanding trade in all products, including forest products. In fact, it appears that the FTAA will include a "Global Free Logging Agreement" like that proposed and thus far defeated at the World Trade Organization.
We can use NAFTA as a model to predict the impact of the FTAA on forests. After signing NAFTA, all three NAFTA countries lowered protections for forests and biodiversity; fifteen U.S. forest product companies set up new operations in Mexico taking advantage of lower environmental and labor safeguards; and one U.S. corporation, Boise Cascade, has been linked to extreme human rights abuses against forest protection activists in Mexico. Boise Cascade has also been blocked in its plans to open the world's largest chip mill in the heart of Chile's endangered rainforests by Chilean and U.S. citizen opposition. However, the FTAA could be the silver bullet the company needs to push their plans to completion.
The FTAA would promote unbridled hemisphere-wide consumption of forest products without a single forest or biodiversity safeguard. U.S. negotiators expect that the FTAA will also include investment liberalization initiatives like those included in NAFTA and the ill-fated Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) that allow corporations to sue governments if environmental laws cause their properties to lose economic value.
A "Global Free Logging Agreement" in the FTAA?
A Global Free Logging Agreement Would:
(A)
(B)
The Clinton Administration has spear-headed negotiations at the World Trade Organization (WTO) on a proposal dubbed by forest advocates as the "Global Free Logging Agreement (GFLA)." After losing its bid (for now) to have the GFLA at the WTO, the Administration appears to have set its sites on the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) as a new venue to push for the proposal which threatens forests and biodiversity.
In fact, a representative of the United States Trade Representative's office confirmed that the FTAA Market Access Negotiating Group is negotiating tariff elimination and non-tariff trade barrier (|NTB) removal for forest products. NTBs are forest and species protections that are argued to interfere with free trade.
Tariff elimination could increase the consumption of forest products, while the elimination of NTBs could threaten existing and future forest protection laws and initiatives. Current logging practices have decimated the world's forests. An increase in such unsustainable practices caused by the GFLA will hasten the deforestation of the world's native forests.
With a GFLA, U.S. laws designed to protect forests, the environment and small locally owned mills can be challenged under the FTAA as NTBs. If challenged and defeated, these laws would have to be eliminated or the U.S. would face costly trade sanctions. The record of trade agreements vs. the environment thus far proves that when faced with a trade-off between "free trade" and environmental protection -- the environment always losses. The GFLA will put these laws are greater risk through the FTAA.
Forest protections that could be threatened include a ban on the export of raw logs from federal and most state lands to protect small local mills and reduce logging; federal and state green procurement laws such as those requiring the use of recycled paper; eco-labeling and certification laws used to identify environmentally friendly products such as sustainably harvested wood; and laws to protect against invasive species invasions.
What You Can Do
Learn more and get involved in the campaign to protect forests from international trade and investment agreements such as the FTAA by contacting American Lands Alliance at (202) 547-9095 or http://www.americanlands.org. You can also join American Lands and other activists from around the world in Quebec, Canada, April 20-22, 2001, for protest, education and organizing events at the Summit of the Americas when governments meet to finalize the FTAA.