welcome ministers – bid farewell to
neo-liberal trade policies
After a week of negotiations at the
Preparatory Meeting for the World Summit for
Sustainable Development, taking place in
Bali, Indonesia, it has become clear that the
free trade agenda is being promoted by
governments, at the expense of sustainable
development.
Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) is
calling on the world's ministers arriving in
Bali today, to reverse this process, and
ensure that the World Trade Organisation's
((WTO) trade agenda does not continue to
undermine poverty alleviation and the
conservation of the environment.
“We have seen a week of debate in which
civil society's concerns regarding the
impacts of trade liberalisation have been
ignored.
Ministers must act now and use the
Johannesburg Summit to establish clear social
and environmental limits to economic
globalisation” said Ricardo Navarro, Chair of
Friends of the Earth International.
FoEI is proposing specific changes to the
text of the Chairman's paper that would
ensure that the Chairman's text no longer
pretends that sustainable development can
simply be delivered through trade
liberalisation under the WTO.
FoEI among more than 150 organisations from
more than 40 countries (1) calls on
governments to affirm the authority and
autonomy of Multilateral Environmental
Agreements (MEAs) and clarify that the
objectives, principles and provisions of MEAs
must not be subordinated to WTO rules.
“FoEI welcomes ministers to Bali but urges
them to ensure that Heads of States at
Johannesburg establish the primacy of
sustainable development over the trade regime
and ensure that international economic
institutions ike the World Bank, IMF and WTO
support this objective ” Ricardo Navarro
said.
Note
(1) The
full statement on the WTO-MEA relationship
can be found at
www.rio-plus-10.org
.
Contact FoEI Bali media team: 0818 560 730
or +44 7810558249
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