ICFTU releases report on WTO, Workers' Rights and EPZs

Sept 2003,

Dear friends,

For your information, please find attached information on our release today on workers' rights, EPZ and the WTO.

Best, Duncan

International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU)

ICFTU Online... 123/080903...

Cancun, Mexico, 08 September 2003 (ICFTU News): As hundreds of trade ministers and officials are on their way to Cancun to open on Wednesday 10 September the 5th Ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the world's largest trade union group has condemned member states of the WTO for deliberately keeping the central item of workers' rights off the organisation's agenda. In a new report launched today, the Brussels-based International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) says that "the negative downward spiral of lower labour standards will continue, as governments compete against each other for foreign investment by offering cheaper labour, tax breaks and other concessions". It accuses WTO member countries of refusing to even allow WTO discussion of pressing social problems relating to globalisation.

The 25-page report on Export Processing Zones (EPZs) entitled "EPZs: Symbols of Exploitation and a Development Dead-End" describes the poverty wages and appalling working conditions of most of the world's 43 million EPZ workers, and calls on the world trade body to "renew and demonstrate its commitment to uphold core labour standards". The Cancun meeting, according to the ICFTU, must take a decision that human rights, including fundamental workers' rights, take priority over trade rules, and should start working on this without delay, as described in the report.

The report is accompanied by exclusive new video footage from EPZs in the Dominican Republic, Honduras and the Philippines, which graphically demonstrates how workers are exploited, and how workers trying to organise trade unions are often sacked, or even violently assaulted by thugs hired by employers.

For the ICFTU, EPZs are an international symbol of the exploitative nature of today's globalisation, highlighting broader concerns about the negative impact of WTO rules on workers in the private and public sectors worldwide. "By its very nature, EPZ investment is precarious, and likely to leave the country at a moment's notice if a cheaper, more compliant workforce is on offer somewhere else", the report notes. It also exposes the myth that EPZs contribute to real economic development, with workers living in slum conditions and frequently deprived of health care, education for their children and even basic public services, while EPZ companies pay no taxes.

ICFTU General Secretary Guy Ryder, leading a 150 strong international trade union delegation to the talks, will address a press conference today in Cancun. According to Ryder, "Globalisation has the potential to bring prosperity to people across the world, but today's crude, free market globalisation is pushing standards down and leading to massive exploitation. The absence of effective multilateral trade rules to support the standards set by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) cannot be allowed to continue, yet governments are refusing to even allow the WTO and the ILO to work together on the problem".

The survey notes that the number of EPZs has grown from 79 in 1975 to 3,000 in 2002 and the number of countries with one or more EPZs has gone from 25 to 116 in the same period. Many developing countries, especially in Central America and in Asia, are losing investment to China's economic zones, where independent unions a ruthlessly repressed by the state, and workers toil for as little as US$ 1.20 a day.

One of the more dramatic examples in the report concerns the pregnancy tests imposed by some employers in the maquilas (EPZs) of Mexico. In factories located along the US border, women are often subjected to humiliating physical examinations to prove that they are not pregnant, while employers in the Philippines have forced their workforce to take amphetamines to meet tight production deadlines imposed by well-known multinational clothing and footwear brands.

The ICFTU's investigations have also detailed cases of physical violence in the largest EPZ employer in the Dominican Republic, Grupo M, which supplies major international clothing brands and is expected to soon receive a US$23m loan from the World Bank's International Finance Corporation (IFC). Workers who tried to join a union in one of Grupo M's factories report beatings and illegal detentions by company-sponsored thugs inside the factory, which is known for its anti-union attitude. The ICFTU has written to the IFC calling on it to make respect for fundamental labour standards a condition of its loan, for an EPZ development which straddles the Dominican Republic/Haiti border.

"The Dominican Republic case highlights major fault-lines in the international system, fault-lines which are evident just about everywhere. These fault-lines have to be fixed if global trade and investment are to bring real, sustainable development and an end to the scandal of global poverty", concludes Guy Ryder.

For more information on the international trade union movement position: http://www.global-unions.org/globalisation

Link to the report on Export Processing Zones entitled "Free Trade Zones - Symbols of Exploitation and a Development Dead-End"

Note to Editors: Press Conference September 8 - 14h00 to 14h30 at the Sierra Hotel Room 3 "La Venta" with Guy Ryder, General Secretary ICFTU and Raquel Clavillas, Organizer in export processing zones, Philippines under the Theme: "Race to the Bottom - WTO undermining workers' rights"

Contact: Louis Belanger - ICFTU Press Officer in Cancun on +32 4 76 621018.

The ICFTU represents 158 million workers in 231 affiliated organisations in 150 countries and territories. ICFTU is also a member of Global Unions: http://www.global-unions.org

For more information, please contact the ICFTU Press Department on +32 2 224 0232 or +32 476 621 018.