Tom
Doug Henwood wrote:
> [bounced for an attachment - the AFL-CIO's signing is the news here]
>
> From: sawicky at epinet.org (Max Sawicky)
> Date: Thu, 28 Oct 1999 10:21:55 -0400
>
> Wednesday October 27, 10:47 pm Eastern Time
> Business Leaders Back WTO Agenda
> By KEVIN GALVIN
> Associated Press Writer
> WASHINGTON (AP) -- Despite protests over the upcoming World Trade
> Organization meeting, labor leaders have joined with their corporate
> counterparts on a presidential advisory board to support the
> administration's trade agenda.
>
> A handful of the 35 panelists declined to sign a letter backing Clinton's
> WTO strategy. But administration officials said the expression of support by
> the Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations as a ``conceptual
> breakthrough.''
>
> ``This sort of compromise and acknowledgment of mutual interest has been
> long sought after,'' U.S. Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky said in
> an interview Wednesday. ``This is the first time in six and one-half years
> that labor has not dissented from an ACTPN initiative, or that the business
> community has not dissented.''
>
> Also Wednesday, President Clinton and the leader of the European Commission
> met to discuss the trade talks. Officials said progress was made on areas of
> dispute such as the U.S. export of genetically altered foods.
>
> Clinton and the commission president, Romano Prodi, agreed to high-level
> talks before year's end on biotechnology, and the United States is assisting
> the Europeans in creating an agency similar to the U.S. Food and Drug
> Administration.
>
> ``This is a very sensitive subject,'' Prodi said. ``We need to give
> guarantees to our constituents that the scientific controls will be of the
> highest level.''
>
> The White House chief of staff, John Podesta, led administration efforts to
> forge a strategy for the WTO ministerial talks, set to begin in late
> November in Seattle.
>
> Labor leaders were pleased by the administration's call for a working group
> within the WTO to deal with issues such as worker rights and protections,
> which business leaders traditionally have tried to keep separate from trade
> deals.
>
> Four groups, including the Consumers Union of America and the American Farm
> Bureau Federation, declined to sign the letter. But that did not dampen the
> administration's enthusiasm over the compromise between labor and business.
>
> ``This is where the most serious degree of conflict has existed over a
> marketization agenda,'' Barshefsky said. ``That gap has been bridged.''
>
> The letter, written by Procter & Gamble's John E. Pepper, chairman of the
> commission established by Congress and named by Clinton, was signed by,
> among others, Robert Shapiro of Monsanto Co. (NYSE:MCT - news; NYSE:MTC -
> news), Curtis H. Barnette of Bethlehem Steel Corp., Thomas J. Donahue of the
> U.S. Chamber of Commerce, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney and Jay Mazur,
> president of UNITE!, a New York-based labor union.
>
> ``While, not surprisingly, all of our members are not in agreement on every
> element of this agenda, a strong majority ... believe that the U.S.
> negotiating agenda as a whole is bold and appropriately comprehensive,''
> said the letter, obtained by The Associated Press. ``We believe that if
> achieved, it will result in better jobs, higher living standards and
> increased economic opportunities for all Americans.''
>
> Thea Lee, a trade expert at the AFL-CIO, said that labor's endorsement of
> the administration's negotiating strategy should not be seen as an
> abandonment of labor's concerns about the WTO and its historical lack of
> consideration for labor issues.
>
> ``The concept of the ACTPN letter was broad support for many of the U.S.
> goals, including putting forward a working group on trade and labor,'' Lee
> said. ``We have a lot of other issues and we have a lot of critiques of the
> WTO that aren't changed by our signing onto the ACTPN letter.''
>
> The meeting with Prodi also yielded what Barshefsky said were
> ``encouraging'' signs in the standoff between the United States and Europe
> over exports of beef and bananas.
>
> ``We have to be cautious here because we know these two issues are difficult
> for European policy,'' Barshefsky said. ``But there seems to be renewed
> vigor on the part of Europe to reach mutually agreeable solutions.''
>
> The United States has imposed punitive tariffs on more than $300 million of
> European products in retaliation for the 15-nation European Union's refusal
> to abide by WTO decisions involving American beef and bananas.
>
> Prodi and Clinton also agreed to coordinate efforts to get developing
> countries committed to the new round of international trade negotiations.