will the new nafta make the pandemic worse for mexicans?

WILL THE NEW NAFTA MAKE THE PANDEMIC WORSE FOR MEXICANS? By David Bacon, Foreign Policy in Focus,  July 6, 2020 https://fpif.org/will-the-new-nafta-make-the-pandemic-worse-for-mexicans/ https://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com/2020/07/will-new-nafta-make-pandemic-worse-for.html Elva Nora Cruz is the sister of a fired member of the Sindicato Mexicano de Electricistas (SME).  44,000 workers were fired and the state-owned electrical company was dissolved as part of the wave of privatization and economic reforms in the wake of NAFTA.  She sits with Triqui women protesting violence in Oaxaca under a tent in Mexico City's central square, the zocalo (David Bacon, Stanford University Green Library) For Mexican workers, farmers, and the poor, the pandemic and the new treaty replacing NAFTA are a devastating one-two punch. In the debate over the U.S. Mexico Canada Agreement, the new trade treaty replacing NAFTA that went into effect on July 1, many promises were made about the effectiveness of its labor protections.  Supposedly, they will protect the labor rights of Mexican workers, which will free them to push for better wages and conditions. These promises are reminiscent of those made when the original NAFTA was debated over a quarter of a century ago. At the time, its corporate backers insisted it would lead to prosperity for workers and farmers, who would no longer be obligated to leave home to find work in the United States. Whether the old treaty created better conditions-for workers in the maquiladora factories on the border, for Mexican migrants toiling in U.S. fields, or for farmers in the communities from which the migrants come-is more than an economic issue. In the era of the pandemic, the record of the old treaty must be examined to determine as well its responsibility for life and death. Did the changes it provoked make Mexicans more vulnerable to the virus? And because it continues the same economic regime, the new agreement cannot avoid raising the same questions. The Impact on Mexico NAFTA had a devastating impact on Mexican workers, farmers, and the poor, and its labor and environmental side agreements did nothing to protect them. The problem lies in the agreement's purpose-to facilitate the penetration of U.S. capital in Mexico. By taking down barriers to investment and the activity of U.S. corporations, it instituted cataclysmic political and economic changes. The current trade agreement shares NAFTA's purpose and will have the same impact. The 1990 report by the U.S. Congress' Commission for the Study of International Migration and Cooperative Economic Development recommended that the United States negotiate a free trade agreement with Mexico in order to deter migration. But even this report warned, "It takes many years-even generations-for sustained growth to achieve the desired effect," and in the meantime would create years of "transitional costs in human suffering." Mexico's "years of sustained growth" turned out to be a tiny 1.2-2 percent, whose benefits were reaped by a billionaire class that multiplied while real income for workers and farmers fell. The consequences were clearest in the displacement that suffering caused. It set millions of Mexicans into motion as migrants, which now exposes them to the virus. Three million farmers were displaced by corn dumping, to allow U.S. corporations like Cargill and Archer Daniels Midland to take over Mexico's corn market. Mexico lost its CONASUPO stores serving farmers and the poor, and Wal-Mart became the country's largest employer. Waves of privatization, mandated to provide opportunities for banks and investors, cost the jobs of hundreds of thousands as Mexico threw open its economy. As investment increased, the income of Mexicans declined. Investment had health consequences beyond unemployment. The prelude to COVID came in 2009, with the spread of the H1N1 virus, or swine flu. In Mexico some call it the NAFTA flu, because the agreement provided the vehicle for Smithfield Foods to fill the Perote Valley in Puebla with hog farms. The virus started in a valley town, La Gloria.  Its source was the intense concentration of pigs and their waste. The waste from Smithfield's U.S. operations was so considerable it led to prohibitions even by the conservative government of North Carolina. By moving south Smithfield did not just escape environmental protections. It became so dominant that one of every four meals of pork eaten in Mexico now comes from this company's farms and its imports from the United States. But 125,000 Mexicans lost jobs in pig farming in the process, and people got sick and died from the virus all over Mexico. NAFTA's environmental side agreement did nothing to help the people of the Perote Valley stop the company's depredations. The new USMCA makes no change in the Perote Valley and would do nothing to prevent a similar situation in the future. The failure of NAFTA's labor side agreement was even more complete. Not a single independent union won bargaining rights, nor a single fired worker reinstated, because of a NAFTA complaint. That abysmal record continues today. The Mexican miners union has been on strike at the huge Cananea copper mine since 2007. The treaty had no impact on regaining their rights. Instead, NAFTA's freeing of investment to move across borders helped the mine's owner. The wealthy Larrea family bought the ASARCO mines in Arizona, and forced the miners' cross-border allies, the United Steel Workers, out on strike there as well. NAFTA's goal of freeing investment didn't guarantee labor rights; it jeopardized them. The new agreement has precisely the same goal. Migrants Also Suffer Complaints of labor violations weren't made just about Mexico. Some were filed over the violation of workers' rights in the United States. A number were filed on behalf of Mexican immigrants, including the massive firing of immigrant workers during organizing drives by Washington apple workers and Maine egg farm workers. Cases were even filed against the U.S. government itself for denying immigrants protections under U.S. labor standards. None resulted in any concrete action. The side agreement's last case was just settled this week, when seafood workers were told that their H-2B visa status did not protect them against discrimination because they are women. According to the Centro de los Derechos de Migrantes, in 2016 "we submitted a complaint under the NAFTA labor side accord, arguing systemic sex-based discrimination in guest worker programs." Four years later, Mexico's National Administrative Office assured the workers they could report any discrimination to ICE or read about their rights in brochures. The forced migration of these workers, who today are endangered by COVID-19, was a product of NAFTA and its displacing impact in Mexican communities. The number of Mexicans forced to cross the border to find work went from about 4.5 million to 12.5 million in the NAFTA era. The Trump administration now seeks to channel that flow of people. It has cut off visas for family reunification, the achievement of the civil rights movement when it won the end of the bracero program and the passage of the Immigration and Nationalities Act of 1965. As a result of Trump's recent orders, however, displaced people can now only come legally as H-2A guest workers in agriculture. Growers brought a quarter of a million of these workers into U.S. fields last year, and even more are being brought this year, in the middle of the COVID crisis.

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David Bacon is author of Illegal People-How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants (2008), and The Right to Stay Home (2013), both from Beacon Press. His latest book is In the Fields of the North / En los campos del norte, University of California Press, Colegio de la Frontera Norte, 2017. This article is based on a presentation given to a webinar organized by Global Exchange and the California Trade Justice Coalition, an affiliate of the Citizens Trade Campaign.   Free City Radio (Canada) interview: journalist David Bacon on solidarity with Iraqi unions and labour's role in activism https://soundcloud.com/freecityradio/journalist-david-bacon   LABOR MARCH PROTESTS THE POLICE MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD BERKELEY, CA - 13JUNE20 - Hundreds of union members and outraged people march through the streets of Berkeley to protest the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and other African American and people of color killed by police.  The march was organized by the labor councils of Alameda, San Francisco, Contra Costa and San Mateo Counties, and Service Employees International Union Local 1021. To see a full set of photos, click here:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/56646659@N05/albums/72157714734338062 STUDENTS MARCH TO PROTEST THE POLICE MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD BERKELEY, CA - 09JUNE20 - Hundreds of students, teachers and outraged people march through the streets of Berkeley to protest the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and other African Americian and other people of color killed by police.  To see a full set of photos, click here:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/56646659@N05/albums/72157714656895057 HUGE CAR CARAVAN PROTESTS THE POLICE MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD OAKLAND, CA - 31MAY20 - Thousands of people participate in a caravan of over 2000 cars from the Port of Oakland, to protest the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and African American and people of color killed by police. To see a full set of photos, click here:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/56646659@N05/albums/72157714533842187   IN THE FIELDS OF THE NORTH Online Exhibit, May 29 to August 2, 2020 Los Altos History Museum https://www.losaltoshistory.org/exhibits/in-the-fields-of-the-north/   TAKE A VIRTUAL TOUR OF THE EXHIBITION - IN THE FIELDS OF THE NORTH at the History Museum of Tijuana HAGA UN RECORRIDO VIRTUAL DE LA EXPOSICIÓN - EN LOS CAMPOS DEL NORTE en el Museo de Historia de Tijuana https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=659536991515786   TARTINE HARDSHIP FUND Newly organized Tartine Bakery workers in the Bay Area need your help and assistance!  This fund, supported by the International Longhsore and Warehouse Union, will help hose workers unable to collect unemployment insurance. https://www.gofundme.com/f/tartine-union-hardship-fund?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet   The exhibitions in the following list were scheduled before the current COVID-19 crisis.  Public gatherings are not now taking place and these exhibitions have now been postponed or rescheduled. Stay healthy! IN THE FIELDS OF THE NORTH / EN LOS CAMPOS DEL NORTE Online exhibition until August 2 Los Altos History Museum, Los Altos March 21, 2021 - May 23, 2021 Carnegie Arts Center, Turlock MORE THAN A WALL - THE SOCIAL MOVEMENTS OF THE BORDER August 29,, 2020 - November 29,, 2020 San Francisco Public Library DEPORTATIONS Rescheduled for December Uri-Eichen Gallery, Chicago   In the Fields of the North / En los Campos del Norte Photographs and text by David Bacon University of California Press / Colegio de la Frontera Norte 302 photographs, 450pp, 9”x9” paperback, $34.95 (in the U.S.) order the book on the UC Press website: ucpress.edu/9780520296077 use source code  16M4197  at checkout, receive a 30% discount En Mexico se puede pedir el libro en el sitio de COLEF: https://www.colef.mx Los Angeles Times reviews In the Fields of the North / En los Campos del Norte - click here    "The Criminalization of Migration: A Socialist Perspective" with David Bacon and Rafael Pizarro. http://ouleft.org/wp-content/uploads/David-Bacon-The-Criminalization-of-migration.mp4  A video about the Social Justice Photography of David Bacon: https://drive.google.com/file/d/14TvAj5nS08ENzWhw3Oxra4LMNKJCLF4z/view   En los campos del Norte documenta la vida de trabajadores agrícolas en Estados Unidos - Entrevista con el Instituto Nacional de la Antropologia y Historia http://www.inah.gob.mx/es/boletines/6863-en-los-campos-del-norte-documenta-la-vida-de-trabajadores-agricolas-en-estados-unidos Entrevista en la television de UNAM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdSaBKZ_k0o David Bacon comparte su mirada del trabajo agrícola de migrantes mexicanos en el Museo Archivo de la Fotografia http://www.cultura.cdmx.gob.mx/comunicacion/nota/0038-18 Trabajo agrícola, migración y resistencia cultural: el mosaico de los “Campos del Norte” Entrevista de David Bacon por Iván Gutiérrez / A los 4 Vientos http://www.4vientos.net/2017/10/04/trabajo-agricola-migracion-y-resistencia-cultural-el-mosaico-de-los-campos-del-norte/ "Los fotógrafos tomamos partido" Entrevista por Melina Balcázar Moreno - Milenio.com Laberinto http://www.milenio.com/cultura/laberinto/david_baconm-fotografia-melina_balcazar-laberinto-milenio_0_959904035.html Die Apfel-Pflücker aus dem Yakima-Tal http://www.nrhz.de/flyer/beitrag.php?id=23990 EN LOS CAMPOS DEL NORTE:  Farm worker photographs on the U.S./Mexico border wall http://us7.campaign-archive2.com/?u=fc67a76dbb9c31aaee896aff7&id=0644c65ae5&e=dde0321ee7 Entrevista sobre la exhibicion con Alfonso Caraveo (Español) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJeE1NO4c_M&feature=youtu.be   THE REALITY CHECK - David Bacon blog http://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com Books by David Bacon The Right to Stay Home:  How US Policy Drives Mexican Migration  (Beacon Press, 2013) http://www.beacon.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=2328 Illegal People -- How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants  (Beacon Press, 2008) Recipient: C.L.R. James Award, best book of 2007-2008 http://www.beacon.org/Illegal-People-P780.aspx Communities Without Borders (Cornell University/ILR Press, 2006) http://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/?GCOI=80140100558350 The Children of NAFTA, Labor Wars on the U.S./Mexico Border (University of California, 2004) http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520244726 En Español:   EL DERECHO A QUEDARSE EN CASA  (Critica - Planeta de Libros) http://www.planetadelibros.com.mx/el-derecho-a-quedarse-en-casa-libro-205607.html HIJOS DE LIBRE COMERCIA (El Viejo Topo) http://www.tienda.elviejotopo.com/prestashop/capitalismo/1080-hijos-del-libre-comercio-deslocalizaciones-y-precariedad-9788496356368.html?search_query=david+bacon&results=1 For more articles and images, see  http://dbacon.igc.org and http://davidbaconrealitycheck.blogspot.com and https://www.flickr.com/photos/56646659@N05/albums