Corporate power over EU trade policy: good for business, bad for the world.   

This report by the Seattle to Brussels Network (S2B) exposes the undue lobbying by European big business that has resulted in an EU position in the WTO negotiations that is contrary to the “development” agenda of the Doha Round and that has detrimental effects on the environment and on women and men’s livelihoods, well-being, and rights. The report, written by Myriam vander Stichele, Kim Bizzarri and Leonard Plank, gives numerous examples of the damaging impacts of the corporate lobby on EU positions in the negotiation areas of agriculture (processed food industry), services (financial and retail services) and non-agriculture goods (chemicals and natural resources), referring specifically to case studies of companies involved in each of these sectors.

Published by: Seattle to Brussels, October  2006 .
To download the publication click here. 

The EU's responsibility at the WTO: Environment, gender and development 

This report by Friends of the Earth Europe and WIDE addresses WTO negotiations in the areas of agriculture, non-agricultural market access, services and trade and environment - taking into consideration the outcome of the ten year review of the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and the Platform of Action, the World Summit on Sustainable Development and the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals. It highlights issues such as the selling-out of natural resources under the WTO, the importance of people's food sovereignty, the gender dimension of the trade agenda and biosafety.
Moreover, it includes an assessment of the outcome of the Hong Kong Ministerial meeting from gender and environmental perspectives

March 2006, (Euro 8.00).
To download the publication click here. 

The EU corporate trade agenda - 
The role and interests of corporations and their lobby groups in trade policy making in the EU  

"Stop the EU' Corporate Trade Agenda" - this is the slogan of a joint European campaign to expose the anti-development and anti-environment agenda of the EU in the WTO negotiations. The slogan addresses both the Transnational Corporations as the true beneficiaries of trade liberalisation and as influential policy makers in the EU trade policy, but also the EU and its trade agenda, which has a strong bias towards corporate interests. With a focus on the three most relevant and most controversial issues at the end of the Doha Round of WTO negotiations – services, agriculture and NAMA – the new Seattle to Brussels report sheds light on the role of European Transnational corporations and their Brussels based lobby groups but also on the EC that paves the way for their further global expansion. 

Published by: Seattle to Brussels, Berlin/Brussels, November 2005
To download the publication click here. 

Poverty, inequality and insecurity - What answers does feminism have?  

A report of WIDE's 20th Anniversary Conference, hosted by the UK Gender and Development Network, London, 24-25 June  2004

Inequality, international trade relations, peace and security and sexual and reproductive health and rights are highly contested areas that shape women's chances of enjoying and exercising their full human rights. In 'Poverty, inequality and insecurity' these four subthemes are used to address the crucial issues for women and gender equality: rights and power. The development paradigm within which gender and poverty issues have historically been inscribed does not adequately analyse either the power relations or the inequalities on which ‘development’ is based. Thus, in this report unequal power relations are discussed in reference to sexual and reproductive rights and to the 'big boys'- the military and global economic establishment who control the security and trade agenda.  

October 2005 (Euro 8.00).

The enlarged European Union and its agenda for a ‘Wider Europe’: What considerations for gender equality?

Building on several previous WIDE initiatives aimed at raising awareness on the impact of EU enlargement on women's livelihoods and gender equality, this report explores the potential for mainstreaming gender equality in key areas of national policy in the ten new EU member states and other Eastern European countries, and gives policy recommendations for tackling the contradictory effects of the EU enlargement process on gender equality.

February 2005 (Euro 8.00).

To the farthest frontiers: Women’s empowerment in an expanding Europe

This report, published by Eurostep, Social Watch, WIDE and KARAT during the 49th CSW meeting in March, focuses on the promotion of gender equality in the European Union's assistance to Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States. EU policies and instruments are assessed through a fourfold division of the policy process in order to establish the extent to which commitments to gender equality and poverty eradication are carried through the process. 

The report can be ordered directly from EEPA. For a copy, please contact Maxi Ussar at mussar(at)eepa.be

February 2005