This is One World Week, and each day in the BEN, the World Development Movement in Bolton highlights a different issue.
Here, the theme is we are on our way . . . to fair rules in world trade
WE all depend on trade, and we need trade to be fair. In this country, we may go short of a lot that we want, but we take our money to the shops and come back with enough to keep our families fed, clothed and healthy.
It isn't like that for everyone. The rules of world trade are biased against poor countries, so that however hard people work they cannot earn enough to buy the most basic necessities.
One example is that maize farmers in Ethiopia have to compete with US farmers to sell their produce -- but the US maize growers receive subsidies amounting to 10 times the whole income of the Ethiopian farmers.
All this has very practical consequences. It can mean that if someone in your family is ill, you don't just count the pennies, you literally sell the roof over your head. A tin roof can be sold for the price of a drug on which a precious child's life depends.
Then you manage without a roof -- perhaps for a long time -- and hope no one else gets ill. Or children may not be educated, because there are no free schools and fees cannot be afforded.
It doesn't have to be like this. Many of the organisations which have been involved in the campaign to cut the debts of Third World countries have formed the Trade Justice Movement. It aims to attack the negative impact of international trade rules on the poorest people in the world, on the environment, and on democracy, It wants to make trade work for all people.
Fair trade alone won't change unfair rules. For this, we must let the politicians know that we care about justice to everyone. Tariffs and trading agreements may sound horribly technical, but it all comes down to saying that we won't put up with rules that mean hungry children and unnecessary deaths. We are on our way to trade justice.
For more information about the Trade Justice Movement, contact Justicia, 81 Knowsley Street, Bolton, BL1 2BJ. Tel 01204 363308.
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