Fw: Dump NAFTA: Your Trade Action Day Packet]

Replace the Failed NAFTA Model

witnessforpeace.org/october12

Jobs erased, farmers displaced.
Environment polluted, democracy diluted.
NAFTA has now been in effect for 15 years-15 years too many.

People throughout the Americas, including a proven majority of U.S.
citizens, reject the destructive model of the North America Free Trade
Agreement. Yet, it continues to profit the few at the expense of the many.
On October 12--Indigenous Peoples Day--WFP will join social movements
across the hemisphere in launching coordinated, eye-catching actions to
call for this failed model to be replaced with trade that actually
benefits the majority. (More background below)

For a flyer, packet overview, and all online materials, visit
witnessforpeace.org/october12

Join us! Here's how:

* Host a Corn-Based Movie Night in the weeks prior to October 12. This
is a chance for you and some guests to watch the Roots of Migration
video over a tasty corn-based dish (or do a roots-of-migration
reader's theater), discuss local migration or trade concerns, and
create paper corn-cobs to be used in public actions on the 12th.

Materials online:

* Roots of Migration video and instructions/discussion questions
* Factsheet: NAFTA At Fifteen
* Reader's theater activity: Telling It Like It Is
* Stencils/instructions for crafting paper corn
* Petition to Representatives on Immigration and Trade

You can also get a free copy of the Roots of Migration DVD sent via mail.
To do so, contact your regional organizer.

* Dramatize the NAFTA model through corn-based street theater. People
across the country will gather the week of Oct. 12 in public parks and
outside of congressional offices to take part in a simple play that
illuminates how NAFTA facilitates corn dumping and forces migration
(using those paper corn cobs). Get a few friends and do some
awareness-raising that's actually fun.

Materials online:

* Roots of Migration Tableau (silent theatrical display)
* Street theater play in English
* Teatro de la calle en español
* Sign/banner suggestions

* Demonstrate for a new, justice-oriented trade model. Groups across
the hemisphere are organizing rallies for the week of October 12 to
call for NAFTA's replacement. You can join an existing demonstration
(contact your regional organizer for a current list), or join with
others to plan a "Replace NAFTA" rally in your community. The more
participating cities/towns, the merrier.

Materials online: Sign/banner suggestions

Please contact your regional organizer if interested in any of the above.


Background

We have now endured 15 years of a trade model that has stagnated wages at
home and decimated livelihoods abroad. For the last decade and a half,
the North American Free Trade Agreement and its offspring (CAFTA and the
Peru free trade
agreement) have consistently padded the pockets of a few while eroding
workers' negotiating power, consumers' protections, and family farmers'
ability to make ends meet.

We are now the majority. Most people reject models that fail most people.
In Mexico, where only 10% of the population have seen a higher standard of
living since NAFTA, marches and lobbying efforts have amplified a growing
demand to overhaul the agreement. In the U.S., where 56% of the population
wants NAFTA renegotiation, over 100 Congressional representatives recently
introduced the TRADE Act-a bill that would revamp the existing agreements.

We'd like our "change" now. During his campaign, President Obama promised,
"One of the first things I'll do as president will be to call the Prime
Minister of Canada and the President of Mexico and work with them to fix
NAFTA." By contrast, when President Obama went to Mexico in August to meet
with these two leaders, he stated, "Given the weakened state of the U.S.,
Mexican and Canadian economies, this is not the time to reopen the NAFTA
treaty for negotiations." He missed the point: the very economic and
financial deregulation policies enshrined in NAFTA have contributed to the
present crisis. The economic crisis does not overshadow, but accentuates
the need to replace NAFTA.

Now is the time for action. October 12 is for some the day that Colombus
"discovered" this hemisphere. But for many in this hemisphere, October 12
marked the beginning of over 500 years of foreign domination, cultural
destruction, and systematic exploitation-a history that the NAFTA model
perpetuates. Social movements across the hemisphere have declared this
October 12 "International Trade Action Day." On this day, hundreds of
groups in over a dozen countries will launch coordinated eye-catching
actions to call for the failed NAFTA model to be repealed and replaced.
Join us.