Trade and migration: Why TTIP would exacerbate the problem
by Cornelia Reetz
Tens of thousands of people have reached Europe in the past couple of
weeks alone. Many of them are escaping from war, persecution and human
rights abuse – in Syria, Jemen, Iraq or elsewhere. Others are fleeing
from hunger and poverty in the hope of a better life in Europe. What
hardly anyone is talking about: TTIP would aggravate migration flows
further. The one-sided trade policy of the EU and other industrialised
countries has had a number of negative impacts on developing countries.
Instead of reforming this trade policy in order to better the lives of
people who would be forced to migrate, EU and US intend to set this
policy in stone with TTIP and similar trade agreements – with
devastating consequences.
Poorer access to EU and US markets
The export of agricultural goods and raw materials is one of the most
important sources of revenue for many developing countries. If EU and
USA agree to lower tariffs on agricultural goods when trading with each
other, the prices of these products fall. Products from developing
countries, however, do not profit from lower tariffs and hence can’t
compete anymore. This hits producers in developing countries.
Corporations against small-scale farm structures
The EU and US aim to harmonise standards for agricultural produce,
which would inevitably lower them (for instance by allowing higher
pesticide residues on food). This would benefit large agro-businesses
because it would mean lower production costs and they could sell
products more cheaply. At the same time, EU farmers benefit from
subsidies, which allows them to lower prices further. Producers in
developing countries and emerging nations are rarely able to withstand
this price spiral to the bottom and have to give up their farms, amongst
them many small-scale farmers. In West Africa, for instance, many
chicken farmers were forced to pack in because ever more cheap meat
(usually scraps of chicken that aren’t popular with EU consumers)
flooded the market and destroyed prices for domestically produced
chicken. TTIP would exacerbate this problem. However, it’s exactly these
small-scale farm structures that are so important to defeat hunger and
poverty in poorer countries – whereas it’s these very structures that
our current world trade regime destroy, taking away people’s livelihood.
Image: http://www.ulystrations.com/?Pilleurs
Continuation of the ailing world trade regime
Developing countries and emerging nations were forced to liberalise
their markets for products, services and investments as part of the
World Trade Organisation (WTO) negotiations, as well as by International
Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank in the 1990s and 2000s. At the same
time, these countries were unable to secure fair conditions for market
access for their products in industrialised nations. Only in the current
WTO negotiation round, Southern countries managed to successfully
resist further liberalisation. As a result, the Doha round, started in
2001, has still not been completed. Industrialised countries are now
taking revenge: they have started to conclude more and more bilateral
trade agreements (i.e. agreements with one country, sometimes a group of
countries at a time), either excluding developing nations all together
or entering into direct agreements with them, taking full advantage of
their much stronger negotiation power. That’s how developing nations
have little choice but to remain in their old role in the yoke of the
global economic system as providers of raw materials and cheap labour.
World economic order destroys people’s livelihoods
When natural resources are exploited without any restrictions, human
rights abuses and the destruction of the environment are the
consequence. The revenue of these exploitations goes straight into the
pockets of foreign investors, not local people. In addition, climate
change hits the poorest of the poor, even though it’s our Western
lifestyle that has caused it. Extreme weathers such as droughts and
floods are a catastrophe for people in the countryside, which have no
means of adjusting to these new conditions. TTIP stands for the
preservation of a world economic order that focuses on unhindered
economic growth and the liberalisation of markets, although it is clear
by now that this model is responsible for climate change, natural
exploitation and the devastations that are associated with this.
Conclusion
TTIP continues a trade policy that has contributed to the rise of
poverty and misery in developing countries and emerging nations. The
livelihood of many people in the South is destroyed, which is one of
many reasons for migration – not to mention wars that can have their
roots in unequal distribution. If you sow poverty and inequality, you
will harvest refugees. This is another reason to reject TTIP and similar
agreements!
Sign the ECI against TTIP and CETA now!
