WTO-CANCUN: Workers’ Rights Linked to Trade

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Ramesh Jaura

CANCUN, Sep 12 2003 (IPS) - As governments in developing and developed countries compete for foreign investment by offering cheap labour and tax breaks, human rights are being increasingly consigned to oblivion, says a new report.

As governments in developing and developed countries compete for foreign investment by offering cheap labour and tax breaks, human rights are being increasingly consigned to oblivion, says a new report.

With this in view, trade unions are urging the World Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial conference to take a decision that human rights, including fundamental workers’ rights, take priority over trade rules. They want the WTO to start working on this without delay.

The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), backed by the German Confederation of Trade Unions (DGB) has initiated the move. This follows a report released by ICFTU earlier this week that exposes lack of workers rights in export promotion zones (EPZs).

"The actions of the WTO need coherence, not just with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, but with the relevant agencies of the United Nations system and with the decisions reached at the World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) just one year ago," says the Brussels-based ICFTU.

It calls upon the ministerial conference under way to direct the WTO Director- General to strengthen the WTO’s collaboration with relevant UN agencies.

Explaining the initiative, ICFTU General Secretary Guy Ryder said: "Globalisation has the potential to bring prosperity to people across the world, but today’s crude, free market globalisation is pushing standards down and leading to massive exploitation."

He was speaking to government officials, members of parliament and representatives of non-governmental organisations at a seminar in Cancun organised by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation (FES), close to the ruling Social Democratic Party in Germany.

"The absence of effective multilateral trade rules to support the standards set by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) cannot be allowed to continue, yet governments are refusing to even allow the WTO and the ILO to work together on the problem," Ryder said.

He was referring to the ICFTU report launched ahead of the WTO ministerial conference. According to the report, "the negative downward spiral of lower labour standards will continue as governments compete against each other for foreign investment by offering cheaper labour, tax breaks and other concessions."

It accuses member countries of the world trade body of refusing to allow discussion of pressing social problems relating to globalisation at the WTO..

The 25-page report on EPZs entitled ‘EPZs: Symbols of Exploitation and a Development Dead-End’ points to poverty wages and appalling working conditions among most of the world’s 43 million EPZ workers.

It calls on the world trade body to "renew and demonstrate its commitment to uphold core labour standards."

The report is accompanied by exclusive new video footage from EPZs in the Dominican Republic, Honduras and the Philippines, which graphically demonstrates how workers are exploited, and how workers trying to organise trade unions are often sacked, or even violently assaulted by thugs hired by employers.

For the ICFTU, EPZs are an international symbol of the exploitative nature of today’s globalisation, highlighting broader concerns about the negative impact of WTO rules on workers in the private and public sectors worldwide.

"By its very nature, EPZ investment is precarious, and likely to leave the country at a moment’s notice if a cheaper, more compliant workforce is on offer somewhere else," the report notes.

It also exposes the myth that EPZs contribute to real economic development, with workers living in slum conditions and frequently deprived of health care, education for their children and even basic public services, while EPZ companies pay no taxes.

Addressing the seminar, parallel to the WTO ministerial conference, DGB demanded from the WTO democracy, transparency and equal treatment of social, ecological aspects and aspects of development policy in all trade issues.

Michael Sommer, president of the DGB, also stressed the need for collaboration between the WTO and ILO. The DGB is Europe’s largest union with some 7.7 million members.

"We trade unions in Europe are no enemies of the kind of globalisation which brings more well-being for the North and the South," said Sommer.

"But we are opposed to and critical of a neo-liberal and destructive globalisation that is oriented only towards capital, such as we still find in many ways in the current system of the WTO," he added, addressing the FES seminar.

Sommer pleaded for imposing human rights and basic social and ecological standards as well as the right to development through binding regulations worldwide in the framework of the WTO and through the strengthening of the ILO.

The ICFTU and the DGB consider the implementation of the core labour standards of the ILO the most important criterion for the future of the WTO and for the social face of globalisation.

The two trade unions are opposed to putting developing countries under pressure to take measures and fulfil conditions that are not appropriate for their economic and social development.

"They must have the possibility to take stock of the consequences of liberalising commitments that they have already accepted and have the possibility to backtrack on them if need be," said Sommer.

He also pleaded for giving institutional and financial resources to developing countries to enable them to participate along with other WTO members at an equal level. For that to happen, the WTO regulations need greater democracy, transparency, fairness and dependability, he says.

This implies improved market access for the countries of the South, reduction of non-tariff barriers, reduction of tariff barriers in the North for processed goods, the reduction of trade-distorting export subsidies especially in the agricultural sector, and additional technical assistance in order to improve the offers of available products.