Fred Martinez's Monitor

Nafta is Bad for Mexico

Mexican bishops say NAFTA is leading to country's cultural death

Published: 2008-02-05

MEXICO CITY (CNS) -- Mexico's Catholic bishops have pleaded with the federal government to renegotiate a trade treaty with the U.S. and Canada that they say is leading to the cultural death of their nation.

The bishops said the Jan. 1 abolition of agricultural tariffs under the North American Free Trade Agreement is putting poor Mexican farmers out of business and threatening the destruction of entire rural communities.

They said farmers and their families are now being driven to migrate to cities in Mexico or to the U.S., which "currently has a very strong and anti-humane immigration program."

In a mid-January statement, the bishops' social action commission called on the state to "analyze the legal possibilities and economic feasibility of renegotiating the agricultural section of the free trade agreement in order to protect more decisively the interests of the poor rural and indigenous communities who are in the majority."

The statement, signed by 10 bishops, said, "There exist legal, economic and moral conditions to renegotiate this section, which should be the priority for the government and legislators."
[http://www.georgiabulletin.org/world/2008/02/05/WORLD-1/]

posted by Fred Martinez @ 4:00 PM