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SUMMIT
OF THE AMERICAS:
Leaders Agree to
Disagree on FTAA
Marcela
Valente
MAR DEL PLATA, Argentina,
(IPS) - After a debate that
stretched hours past the
scheduled closing time, the
fourth Summit of the Americas
ended Saturday in the Argentine
resort of Mar del Plata with a
final declaration that clearly
reflects the divergent views
among governments in the region
with respect to the future of
the FTAA.
The heads of state and
government who continued to take
part in the summit on Saturday,
after a number of leaders had
left, failed to reach a
consensus on hemisphere-wide
integration – an issue that took
centre-stage even though it was
not even formally on the agenda.
In the summit’s final
declaration, the points
referring to the FTAA (Free
Trade Area of the Americas),
which is promoted by Washington
and questioned by the members of
the Mercosur (Southern Common
Market) trade bloc and
Venezuela, outline the different
views regarding the proposed
Americas-wide free trade zone.
Argentine Foreign Minister
Rafael Bielsa explained in a
news briefing that the first
section on the FTAA, consisting
of four paragraphs set forward
by Panama, expressed the
position of the countries that
would like the regional free
trade talks to move ahead under
the conditions that have
governed them up to now.
In the second section on the
FTAA, consisting of one
paragraph, the five dissenting
countries, Venezuela and the
four full members of Mercosur –
Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and
Uruguay – state that "The
conditions do not exist to
attain a hemispheric free trade
accord that is balanced and fair
with access to markets that is
free of subsidies and distorting
practices."
They also say an agreement would
have to take into account the
needs of all of the partners, as
well as the different levels of
development and size of the
economies.
The third section on the
proposed hemispheric free trade
zone consists of a Colombian
initiative: a call for a meeting
of trade negotiators – not at
the ministerial level – who
would assess the situation and
issue recommendations.
That meeting, to be organised by
Colombia, would be held after
the December World Trade
Organisation (WTO) ministerial
conference in Hong Kong.
Although the central theme of
the Mar del Plata summit was
"Creating jobs to reduce poverty
and strengthen democratic
governance", the discussions
were held up when a group of
countries led by Mexico demanded
that the final document contain
an explicit commitment to
reviving the FTAA negotiations.
That position is backed by the
United States, Canada and 27
nations of Latin America and the
Caribbean.
Fox said free trade was the best
way to reduce poverty and argued
that the agreement should go
ahead even if some of the
countries in the hemisphere
refused to join in.
Opposition to the FTAA was
bluntly expressed by Venezuelan
President Hugo Chávez, who told
the "counter-summit" organised
Tuesday through Friday by civil
society groups and leftist
political parties that the free
trade project should be buried
once and for all in Mar del
Plata.
The third Peoples' Summit drew
up a declaration calling for an
immediate and definitive end to
the FTAA negotiations.
The participants in the civil
society gathering, who
maintained that a hemispheric
free trade zone would cause
serious harm to their countries,
organised a peaceful march on
Friday to protest U.S. President
George W. Bush’s visit to
Argentina.
Unlike Chávez, who declared the
FTAA "dead", the Mercosur
presidents did not reject the
initiative flat out, but said it
made no sense to discuss
regional trade liberalisation
with just one month to go to the
WTO ministerial conference.
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio
Lula da Silva said Saturday that
the debate on hemispheric
integration would be clearer
once the Doha Round of
multilateral trade talks moved
ahead in Hong Kong.
Advances in the Doha Round, said
Lula, must include the
elimination of the
industrialised North’s barriers
to farm products from the
developing South.
"I did not come here to discuss
the FTAA, but to talk about
employment," said Lula at the
two-day summit.
For his part, Paraguayan
President Nicanor Duarte
maintained that the free trade
debate is not an ideological
one, and that pursuing trade
liberalisation does not imply
being more or less progressive
than anyone else.
He added, however, that "the
FTAA is not fair or equitable
for the least developed
countries."
The controversy over the FTAA,
and the consequent threat that
the summit would end without a
final declaration, shifted the
spotlight from what was supposed
to be the central focus of the
meeting: job creation and
poverty reduction.
The emphasis on this subject was
considered a landmark in the
history of these meetings, the
first of which was held in 1994
in Miami, as a U.S. initiative.
For Argentine Deputy Foreign
Minister Jorge Taiana, the
coordinator of the summit, the
most important outcome of the
meeting was that the 34
participating nations - all of
the countries of the hemisphere
except Cuba – agreed to adopt a
declaration that addressed the
creation of decent work.
"This changes the focus of
political discussion in the
hemisphere," Taiana declared at
the end of the meeting.
The same view was expressed by
the director of the
International Labour
Organisation (ILO), Juan Somavía,
who was the moderator at one of
the summit sessions.
"Putting the theme of work at
the heart of discussion on
public policies was undreamed of
in the hemisphere four years
ago, when the summit was held in
Quebec," Somavía told IPS.
Somavía believes that the
priority placed on decent work
on the agenda of the leaders of
the Americas represents "the
embryo of a paradigm shift with
regard to development."
Even when free trade agreements
are signed, if employment is a
main focus, there will be
policies to protect those who
could be adversely affected, he
remarked.
The final declaration emphasised
that economic growth is not
sufficient to guarantee job
creation, and stressed the need
to generate quality employment,
as opposed to subsistence level
employment.
A plan of action outlining
measures to reach these goals
was also signed.
The hemisphere’s leaders
additionally adopted
declarations on the situation in
Haiti, Bolivia, Nicaragua and
Colombia, and on the Doha Round.
The Rio Group countries issued a
declaration to compensate for
the fact that the summit they
had planned to hold in Argentina
in September did not take place.
The Rio Group – made up of 18
Latin American and Caribbean
nations - pledged to continue
its cooperation in a long-term
strategy for the development of
Haiti after elections are held
in the Caribbean nation.
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