- Does the
inability of a nation - even the US - to produce its own food and to
feed its people pose a tremendous threat for the security of that
nation?
- Isn't
the impossibility of people in rural areas of the underdeveloped world
to live decently from their own work a threat to mental health, to human
dignity, community cohesion, and therefore, to peace?
- In whose interests are treaties like NAFTA established? Many people in other nations see these treaties as instruments used to impose an unfair, unjust world order where multinational corporations and big powers use rural communities and poor nations to accumulate wealth and power for themselves, leaving behind poverty and environmental devastation.
When campesinos (Mexican family farmers) take their native white corn to market they are told: "We can’t take your corn because we already have yellow American corn that is much cheaper." When they can’t sell corn, some producers begin to grow other crops. The Mexican government suggested to farmers in Northern Chihuahua that they grow high quality, long fiber cotton. But at harvest time producers hear yet again, from the textile plants: "Sorry, we have a lot of American grown cotton and we don't need yours." Short fiber American cotton is very cheap and dominates the Mexican market.
THE JUICY TRUTH
This preference for cheap American agricultural products is not only felt by commodity producers. Campesinos growing subsistence and staple crops are losing their markets as well. Small-scale Mexican farmers who grow pinto beans to sell in local markets, a staple in the diets of most poor Mexicans, are facing new competition. U.S. producers are flooding markets in Mexico with pinto beans from Colorado. The inability of local producers to sell the most fundamental agricultural products locally has led to complete destabilization of local food systems in many Mexican communities.
The growing exportation of grains from the United States to Mexico under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has had very severe implications for Mexican agriculture and Mexico's rural people. Today, Mexicans have become dependent on U.S. grain to meet their basic nutritional needs. Poor farmers, who produce mainly corn and beans, have been driven out of business as market prices drop because of under-priced U.S. grain spilling over into Mexican markets.
While US producers struggle on their farms as well, those who produce commodity crops have the advantage of government programs that, though minimal, provide market and price subsidies, and disaster payments to supplement market losses. These payments make it possible for U.S. grain to be sold below the cost of production to Mexican markets. Campesinos in Mexico receive only a tenth of the support US producers do, and have virtually no safety net to protect them against drastically low prices and collapsing markets. Many farmers are forced to burn their fields and dump the harvest rather then bringing it to market (see attached article).
NAFTA as it was negotiated, NAFTA as it was approved, and NAFTA as it is practiced, for agriculture, is a source of poverty, frustration and violence to Mexican farmers, and an engine of out-migration to the US. For every five tons of American corn that agribusiness exports into Mexico, another farmer is forced to cross the border to find a job. Many women are sent to work in the maquila cities, such as Ciudad Juárez, just across the boarder from El Paso, Texas. Free trade is destroying the rural communities and social fabric of Mexico.
The conditions that followed NAFTA are not isolated - the same trends hurt communities exposed to free trade across the globe. As our own society faces the aftermath of the September 11 attacks here, the impact of the ravages of free trade also merit our attention. As we and our counterparts in the movements for peace and justice across the globe work anew to seek conditions for peace everywhere, it is essential that we explore how poverty and instability elsewhere may relate to our own domestic food policies and involvement in international trade agreements.
Ideas to Consider
THE OCTOBER SQUEEZE
Strategies for Global Action
by Victor Quintana, RC Board member and former member of Congress in
Mexico
"The tragedy of September 11, 2001 and all that has followed provides an opportunity to consider all these questions with a new awareness and a better understanding of the conditions of nations and people across the globe. As we seek solutions, we may derive a renewed faith in the work that we do to build a different, new and more just world order.
- We must
intensify our communications and our work together. All the people working
for and on family farms, or in agricultura campesina, must keep networking
and finding new ways to cooperate among ourselves and share our experiences;
- We must
find peaceful ways to attract the public opinion of the world toward
our positions by launching imaginative and modern campaigns that reach
out to every person, community and country;
- We must
convince the people in new and creative ways that the family farm, campesino
agriculture, must be protected and supported, not only as a source of
food, but also of community, identity, culture and solidarity;
- We must
show the world that it is not the market that will make our planet more
peaceful, sustainable and livable for all;
- We must
work hard to advocate our point of view in national, international and
world forums. We must visualize the day when trade agreements promote
fair trade and echo an understanding that in agriculture, and in the
world of work, are values that cannot be reduced to dollars, euros or
yen; and
- We must become a force of dignity for all people, for the sustainability for our planet, the development of communities and peace for nations.
In this moment, in this millennium sunrise, the existence of this violent struggle calls us to commit ourselves more and more to a ceaseless and peaceful struggle to build the basis of a new world of solidarity."
Contributions to this Juicer made by Víctor Manuel Quintana. Victor serves on the Board of Directors of the Rural Coalition/Coalición Rural, and represents the Frente Democrático Campesino, Frente para la Defensa de Campo Mexicano, and Equipo Pueblo in Mexico. Victor is also a former member of the Congress in Mexico.
Be Part of Our Campaign for Food n’ Justice,
visit www.ruralco.org.
Questions on food and farm policy?
Contact Heather Fenney at (202) 628-7160.
To join or support our work:
Rural Coalition/Coalición Rural
1012 14th Street, NW Suite 1100
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 628-7160
Visit www.Ruralco.org or
www.SuperMarketCoop.com.