"This is not a national conspiracy," said Alvaro López Rios, a coordinator of the coalition of peasant organizations involved in the actions, but an alarm bell about "the possibility of a social explosion." Brutal conditions of exploitation of millions of peasants in Mexico have been aggravated by protectionist barriers imposed by Washington, the sharpening of already unequal competition with giant agricultural corporations in the United States, and low prices in the international market.

Last month some 5,000 sugar cane farmers protested in front of government offices in Mexico City demanding $420 million in unpaid wages. These small growers, the majority growing cane on plots with an average size of only four acres, sell their crops at government-set prices to any of Mexico's 60 sugar mills. They are supposed to receive payment for the crops before the end of the season in May.  
 
U.S. limits imports
The sugar mill owners say they have not paid growers for their crops because they have been affected by a drop in the price of sugar and are being unfairly kept out of the U.S. market. For many growers the payment from the mill is the only income they will receive the entire year.

The Mexican government claims that the original NAFTA agreement allowed Mexico to export all its excess sugar--an estimated 500,000 tons--without any tariffs to the United States as of last October. But the U.S. government has limited Mexico's sugar exports to 116,000 tons a year in order to protect the American sugar industry. This was done in a unilateral move when Washington introduced a "side letter" to the trade agreement, something the Mexican government refuses to recognize. It has generated what some in Mexico have referred to as a "sugar war."

The sugar industry represents 3.5 percent of Mexico's gross domestic product and employs close to half a million workers. It's vital to the economy of 227 municipalities in 15 states. The Mexican daily La Jornada called the crisis in Mexico's sugar industry the worst in its history.

In addition to the protectionist measures, Mexico's sugar has been affected by growing imports of high fructose corn syrup from the United States for use by the soft drink industry. From 1994, when NAFTA took effect, to the end of last year, some 1.3 million tons of fructose have been imported into Mexico.

Faced with growing pressures from the sugar industry, the Mexican government imposed tariffs to limit the imports of the sweetener. According to La Jornada, some 280,000 tons of highly subsidized corn used to make the fructose comes into the country from the United States with zero tariffs.

The 3.5 million corn growers in Mexico have also been affected by a 45 percent drop in corn prices in the last three years. In July, farmers in the state of Sinaloa, unable to sell 2.4 million tons of corn due to the market being flooded with imports from the United States, blocked access to gas depots demanding higher tariffs.

"The control of trade and production is more and more in the hands of transnational corporations," said Alberto Gómez of the National Union of Autonomous Peasant Regional Organizations. He said 50 international corporations dominate production and sales of food products in the world. Six enterprises dominate 85 percent of the trade of cereal and another six control 80 percent of coffee sales, he said.

The protests in Mexico included a national strike last December by tens of thousands of mill workers demanding a 25 percent wage increase and improved retirement benefits.  
 
Rice producers affected
Along with corn producers in Sinaloa, rice farmers in the state of Campeche carried out takeovers demanding the renegotiation of $4 million in loans. In the border state of Chihuahua farmers forced back grain shipments from the United States.

Pedro Alejandro Díaz explained to La Jornada that this year's rice production will drop to 180,000 tons from 260,000 last year, while imports rose by 60,000 tons. Farmers growing coffee, beans or wheat, or raising hogs or cattle face similar situations, with declining opportunities to sell their products on the market, said Díaz.

"Poverty and migration have not torn the peasants from their plots of land because they have a cultural expression and a way of life that the current rulers despise," said Max Correa, a leader of the Cardenista Peasant Confederation, referring to the resistance going on in the countryside.

"President [Vicente] Fox and [Secretary of Agriculture Javier] Usabiaga can put up with this situation because their economic problems are solved. But this is not so for farmers who are impoverished and lack capital," added Alvaro López, the coordinator for the Permanent Agrarian Congress.

Meanwhile, a dispute in the U.S. ruling class has erupted over allowing trucks from Mexico to enter the United States, another measure supposedly given the green light under the NAFTA accords. The U.S. Senate passed a measure aimed at preventing trucks from Mexico from traveling more than 20 miles into the United States by imposing stringent safety checks and insurance requirements on them.

A five-member NAFTA arbitration panel previously ruled that the United States is violating NAFTA's trucking provision by blocking access. The Teamsters union has waged a major protectionist campaign urging Congress to impose restrictions that in effect mean trucks from Mexico will be denied entry to the United States beyond the current 20-mile limit.

Mexican president Fox has said that he will not allow U.S. trucks into Mexico until an "equitable and well-thought-out agreement" on the issue is reached. "If no agreement is reached, there won't be any Mexican trucks up there, because they don't want them, but there won't be any American trucks down here, either." President George Bush has said that he would veto the Senate bill because it violates the trade agreement.
 
 
Related articles:
Peasants, facing drought and famine, demand aid now in Central America
Aid now to Central America!
Guatemala protests condemn tax increase
Peasants in Colombia demand debt relief
 
 
 
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