general FTAA info
For your info - details on Free Trade of the Americas summitt happening in Toronto one month prior to WTO. Solidarity, dave
Please circulate to your email lists. You support in building for the Free Trade Area of the Americas Meeting in Toronto is greatly appreciated. To get posters or more information call Stacey Papernick at (416) 351-0095 x 237.
Promises Made, Promises Broken
Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) It's Coming to Toronto
October 31st - November 5thThe Hemispheric Social Alliance members in Canada, through Common Frontiers, are coordinating the "Our Americas: Towards a Peoples; Vision of the Hemisphere" event in Toronto set for November 1-5. It is scheduled to happen in parallel to the fifth Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) Trade Ministers meeting, also being held in Toronto from November 3 & 4th.
A local Toronto FTAA Working Group, convened by the Metro Network for Social Justice and the Toronto and York Region Labour Council and working with Common Frontiers, is organizing various local events to broaden the awareness of Torontonians about the dangers of corporate globalization and build support for alternatives based on social and economic justice.
The FTAA, like the FTA, NAFTA, the Multilateral Agreement of Investment (MAI) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), is a tool of corporate globalization which intensifies the exploitation of working and poor people across the Americas. As social justice and labour activists, we are committed to exposing the corporate agenda which underlies these trade agreements, and to fighting for alternatives to the corporate globalization based on our vision of social and economic justice.
The Working Group is organizing educational, cultural and action events to strengthen and broaden the diversity within the social justice movement in Toronto. The historic contribution of aboriginal peoples in Toronto will be a key focus of the activities organized, as will the organization and mobilization amongst the Latin American and Caribbean communities. The collective organizing will also promote and lend support to building solidarity with the Hemispheric Social Alliance.
Here is what is going to happen:
October 30
"Peoples of the Americas Cultural Festival"
Bickford Centre (Christie and Bloor) 777 Bloor St. West afternoon information tables for community groups, event begins early evening
for tickets call 441-3663 Toronto and York Region Labour Council
(tickets $5 unwaged and $8 waged)October 31
Trick or Treaties? Rally
Nathan Phillips Square 100 Queen Street West
12- 2 p.m.
Wear your costumes to scare away the trade demons! Music (Arlene Mantle, Smokey George, Anne Healy, Kevin Barrett and more), Speakers on various issues and their relation to free trade eg. environment, aboriginal land claims, immigration, food access, workers rights, and many more.There will be interactive events in the square - sponge toss your least favorite trade minister, arts making for the Nov. 4 demo., Zapatista theatre etc.
The event will end in a tour of local sites connected to the trade attrocities that have occured.
November 1
Americas Civil Society Forum
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education
7 p.m.November 4th
"Welcome" the Trade Ministers to Toronto
Metro Convention Centre ( Front and John St.)
7:30 am - 9 am
Morning demonstration putting the trade ministers on trialNovember 5th
Sunrise Ceremony to Celebrate Aboriginal foundations of fair trade in the community
6:45 am meet in High Park at the Grenadier RestaurantFor more information call
Metro Network for Social Justice at (416) 351-0095 x237
Toronto and York Region Labour Council (416) 441-3663The local FTAA Working Groups also includes:
Aboriginal Rights Movement
Centre for Spanish Speaking Peoples
Common Frontiers
Low Income Families Together
Operation 2000/Polaris Institute
OPIRG - Toronto
People Against the MAI
Toronto FTAA ministerial November 1999| OAS Windsor June 2000 | FTAA Quebec April 2001 | www.agp.org