Suicides Linked to Free Trade Policies, says Christian Aid

dublin | worker & community struggles and protests | press release Monday May 16, 2005 19:04 by Niamh Nic Carthaigh - Christian Aid Ireland nnicarthaigh at christian-aid dot org http://www.christian-aid.ie +353 (0)1 611 0801

The damage done: Aid, death and dogma

The damage done: Aid, death and dogma

The 2005 Christian Aid Week report exposes the devastating impact unrestricted ‘free’ trade is having on poor communities in developing countries and calls on governments to end their support for a ruthless orthodoxy that stretches back quarter of a century.

SUICIDES LINKED TO FREE TRADE POLICIES, SAYS CHRISTIAN AID

Unfettered free trade policies backed by Western Governments have led to a crisis in Indian agriculture, spiralling rural debt and an epidemic of suicide among poor farmers, says a new report from Christian Aid.

Shocking new research reveals that more than 4,000 farmers have killed themselves in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh since the ‘reforms’ of a hard-line liberalising regime, in part bankrolled by the British government’s Department for International Development.

This support also involved funding the free market fundamentalist Adam Smith Institute to run a privatising scheme that cost some 45,000 Indian public sector workers their jobs.

The revelations are contained in The damage done: Aid, death and dogma, published to coincide with annual Christian Aid Week 2005 – 15-21 May. The report exposes the devastating impact of unrestricted ‘free’ trade on poor people in India, Ghana and Jamaica.

In Ghana the report shows how democratic institutions have been subverted by the demands of doctrinaire free market policies, where the International Monetary Fund (IMF), backed by the World Bank, effectively overturned a law to protect poor farmers. In Jamaica it illustrates how increasing numbers of women have been driven to prostitution and drug smuggling by a continuing round of liberalisation that has wrecked their employment opportunities.

‘This report shows in stark detail the damage that is done to poor people when the dogma of so-called “free” trade is pursued in the name of poverty relief,’ says Margaret Boden, General Secretary of Christian Aid Ireland. ’The scandals we have outlined in this report must never be allowed to happen again.’

For further information: Niamh Nic Cárthaigh, Christian Aid Ireland. Mobile: 086-354 1124

Notes :
1. Christian Aid is an international development agency working in more than 50 countries to fight poverty and injustice. It works with some of the poorest communities, helping people irrespective of race, religion, culture or background. At home and overseas, we campaign to change the structures that keep people poor, challenging inequality and injustice.

2. Broadcast footage includes an interview with a widow of an Indian farmer who was driven to suicide. It also includes an interview with a girl in Jamaica who describes movingly what drove her to begin working in a brothel, aged just 16.

3. The report can be downloaded from www.christianaid.org.uk/indepth/505caweek/

4. The report is published for Christian Aid Week, 15-21 May 2005. More than 4,000 Irish people will participate in fundraising events during Christian Aid Week. For more information about Christian Aid please go to www.christian-aid.ie