GATHERING in the LARZAC/France Against the World Trade Organisation (WTO) 8 – 10 august 2003
more infos on www.larzac2003.org
(initiative of Confédération Paysanne + many other organisations)
The next meeting of the WTO will be held in Cancun, Mexico, 10 – 14 September 2003. On the agenda : the handover of public services, agricultural trade and natural resources to a handful of multinationals. The list of the damage caused by the WTO never ceases to lengthen. In the countries of the South, farmers are no longer able to live from their labour. They are forced off the land only to add to ever-growing shantytowns and to waves of migrant workers. Public services are sold on orders from the IMF and the World Bank. Access to health care and to education worsens constantly. Hunger is an everyday reality suffered by 850 million men, women and children.
In the countries of the North, corporate relocation and economic restructuring feed massive unemployment. Capitalism poses a constant threat to social rights. The working week lengthens, social security is under attack, large segments of the population lead a precarious and uncertain existence, inequality increases. Repression and criminalisation become the main instruments for maintaining social order. The WTO intensifies competition between the citizens of the world. War is used as an imperialist tool of economic, social and cultural domination.
Throughout the world the environment is devastated. The general interest and the common possessions of humanity (water, land, biodiversity, seed and other natural resources) are privatised.
DON’T LET THEM DO IT ! WE, THE PEOPLES OF THE WORLD, WILL DECIDE OUR OWN FUTURE, NOT THE WTO !
For more information: Jean marc Desfilhes
