[Ip-health] Oxfam Urgent Action: Congress Set to Vote on US-Peru Free Trade Agreement

[Mike Palmedo]

http://act.oxfamamerica.org/campaign/perufta_congress

Urgent action: Congress set to vote on US-Peru Free Trade Agreement

Oxfam America
July 17, 2006

This week the House and Senate will begin the voting process on the
US-Peru free trade agreement. Congressional leaders have scheduled this
vote before the summer recess in the hopes of avoiding public debate
that could turn it into an electoral issue. We need your help today to
tell Congress to oppose this agreement.

In a country where over half the population lives in poverty, this
agreement could raise medicine prices by almost 10 percent within the
first year of implementation, 100 percent in 10 years and 162 percent in
eighteen years.

The agreement will expose Peruvian farmers of cotton and basic grains
like wheat, corn and rice, to potentially ruinous competition with
subsidized US exports. Twenty-five thousand US cotton producers receive
$3.5 billion a year in subsidies from the government. Twenty-eight
thousand Peruvian cotton producers, on the other hand, receive nothing.
This agreement would remove and prohibit protections that seek to remedy
this un-fair advantage.

These examples show how this agreement is a bad deal for poor and
working people of Peru. Please act today and tell Congress to oppose
this agreement today!