Sign-on letter for HOPE for Africa

[Robert Weissman <rob@essential.org>]

As those of you on this list know, the U.S. House of Representatives is
now considering two Africa bills. One, the Africa Growth and Opportunity
Act, would condition existing and some minor trade benefits for African
countries on adherence to IMF-style structural adjustment conditions. The
other, Jesse Jackson, Jr.'s HOPE (Human Rights, Opportunity, Parternship,
Empowerment) for Africa Act would give better benefits with no onerous
conditions -- plus it provides significant debt cancellation.

The Citizens Trade Campaign is circulating the following letter for U.S.
non-governmental groups to sign on to. If you would like to sign on,
please e-mail me <rob@essential.org>, or Scott Nova <snova@citizen.org>,
with your organizational sign-on.

The deadline for signing on to this letter is Monday, February 21.

Robert Weissman
Essential Information			|   Internet:	rob@essential.org

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Dear Representative:

We write to urge you support the HOPE for Africa Act, soon to be introduced
by Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. with original cosponsors including Reps.
Conyers, Cummings, Jackson-Lee and Bonior. The Human Rights, Opportunity,
Partnership and Empowerment (HOPE) for Africa Act represents an equitable
and forward-looking approach to U.S. economic relations with sub-Saharan
Africa.

The HOPE for Africa Act was developed in cooperation with African and U.S.
labor, anti-hunger and other citizens groups to enhance trade relations,
but also to ensure that the benefits of new trade are distributed broadly
to most people in Africa and the U.S. The HOPE for Africa Act originated
after numerous organizations in Africa and the U.S. sought an alternative
simply to opposing the so-called Africa Growth and Opportunity Act. Both we
and our African colleagues want to fight for good legislation that can be
mutually beneficial to both regions.

As the attached letter from the federation of labor in Mauritius
reiterates, the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (reintroduced in this
Congress as HR 434) faces strong and broad opposition in Africa. The
"African Growth and Opportunity Act" would provide neither growth nor
opportunity to the economies of Africa. Although it has a fine name and
findings, its binding provisions would merely enhance the capacity of a
small number of U.S.-based multinational corporations to exploit Africa's -
natural resources and labor markets.

As our African allies pointed out to us, the African Growth and Opportunity
Act offers African nations meager, short-lived trade "benefits" in exchange
for which they must dramatically restructure their economies to suit the
tastes and interests of multinational corporations, financial speculators
and institutions like the International Monetary Fund.  The Act imposes IMF
policies on Africa that have been discredited because of their demonstrably
harmful effects, such as slashing spending on health care and education,
offering public companies and natural resources for sale to foreign capital
and re-orienting agricultural capacity away from meeting domestic food
needs and toward exports to earn the hard currency necessary to satisfy the
demands of foreign creditors. Of course, we strongly oppose the imposition
of this failed NAFTA-style model on the people of Africa.

The HOPE for Africa Act represents an entirely different approach, one
based on two key principles.  1) African nations, like all nations, have a
right to determine for themselves what economic development policies are in
the best interest of the their people.  2) Any effort by the U.S. to
promote mutually beneficial trade relations with Africa must address the
region's economic realities. Currently, a crushing $230 billion external
debt destroys local credit markets and annually drains off huge sums for
interest payments. The debt issue must be addressed in conjunction with the
expansion of trade.


The HOPE for Africa Act:

ú provides the same trade benefits as the African Growth and Opportunity
Act, but does so without harming U.S. workers - and extends further trade
benefits for a range of products not covered in the Growth and Opportunity
Act.  For the five years before all textile and apparel quotas cease, the
HOPE for Africa Act grants African countries some of the textile and
apparel quotas now given to China so that African countries obtain more
access to the U.S. market, while U.S. workers will face no additional net
import competition and job loss.

ú ensures that expanded trade will benefit Africans by requiring that
participating companies employ 80% African workers, have 60% African
ownership, respect internationally-recognized core labor rights and, in the
case of joint ventures involving foreign firms, meet the same environmental
standards as their developed country operations.

ú establishes a multi-year plan to extinguish the African debt, starting
with the relatively small amount owed the U.S. government and over time
moving to IMF and World Bank and private sector debt cancellation.

ú restores an annual guaranteed amount of U.S. aid for sustainable
development in Africa so it will no longer be the only region in the world
without such a guarantee.

In all of these provisions, and in its respect for African
self-determination, the HOPE for Africa Act embodies the new direction in
which U.S. international economic policy should be moving. We urge you to
cosponsor the HOPE for Africa Act today by contacting George Seymoure in
Rep. Jackson's office.

	Sincerely,