a277: Carribean Basin Economic Recovery Act (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: "Walton, Robert" <waltonr@emh1.ftmeade.army.mil>

See page 42 for the US Information Agency's analysis of Haiti's situation.
http://www.ustr.gov/reports/2002cbi-final.pdf

The analysis is significant in that it provides the U.S. government's view
on how Haiti is positioned in terms of the the Act's requirements and
yardsticks.  The Act, written from the perpespective of an industrialized,
developed nation DOES NOT consider the immediate social impact of the
program's requirements on the people it affects.

The Act is insensitive to the political, economic and social situation of
the people and has failed in its purpose.  In the example below, young
children working as unpaid domestic servants is considered a labor standards
violation; their alternative-- starvation, is not considered at all.

"The minimum employment age is fifteen (twelve for domestic employment), and
minors are prohibited
from working in dangerous conditions and working at night in industrial
enterprises. Fierce adult
competition for the few available jobs in the industrial sector ensures that
child labor is not a factor in
the formal economy, but many children work in the rural and informal
sectors. Some young children
are forced to work as unpaid domestic servants.  Though the law provides for
free and compulsory
primary education, about 40% of children never attend school due to extreme
poverty, and are further
dissuaded by nominal education fees."