Trade Justice Movement

The Trade Justice Movement campaigns for fundamental change to the unjust rules and institutions governing international trade, so that trade is made to work for all. 

All too often, multinational corporations that trade around the world cause harm to communities, damage the environment and violate the rights of working people.

The Trade Justice Movement has long been calling on the UK government to make laws that stop big business profiting at the expense of people and the environment.

The Trade Justice Movement is a fast expanding group of organisations. Amongst those who have signed up to the movement is our Federation, Soroptimist International of Great Britain and Ireland.

 

 

UK White Paper ignores developing country concerns
 

From the Trade Justice Movement website:

Tuesday, 15 February 2011

The Government’s White Paper on trade demonstrates an ideological commitment to liberalisation and market opening which flies in the face of decades of evidence that they do not lead inevitably to poverty reduction, and which ignores the concerns of developing countries. For trade to be become an engine of development, it needs to be coherent with national development strategies.

The paper fails to recognise developing country concerns regarding current trade negotiations. Fears regarding the potential damage that could be done by the Doha Development round have been voiced time and again by developing countries and have led to the collapse of the talks, yet the Government is calling for the round to be concluded by the end of the year.

The EU’s Economic Partnership Agreements are in stalemate, and whilst the Government makes a welcome commitment to ensure flexibility in the remaining negotiations, and to support regional integration, there is no reference to the need for viable alternative to EPAs.

Issues of equality and gender are entirely absent from the paper, yet it has been demonstrated time and again that failure to recognise that trade impacts differently on different groups is likely to mean that the poorest, particularly women, are not only unable to benefit from trade but may also experience negative impacts.

There is a welcome commitment to ensuring greater transparency and better impact assessment of European trade deals, as well as the commitment to improving regional integration. However the lack of recognition of the potentially damaging impact of unfettered liberalization, and of the concerns expressed by developing countries leave us with little cause for optimism.

 

Congratulations

Congratulations to former SIGBI APD, Penny Venness, who has been re-elected to the board of the Trade Justice Movement

 

 

 

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