Subject: Sue's letter about NGOs

The Role of NGO'S.


On Jan.4, 2002, the Globe and Mail ran an article entitled: "Biting the hand that feeds you, " which conveyed an entirely incorrect picture of the work of volunteer Non Governmental Organizations. Why should non-violent people who attempt to improve conditions for their neighbours be suspect?

One wonders whether the authors prefer to be be unaware that most people in NGO's are ordinary tax-paying citizens. These are people who are convinced that the multilateral enterprises sponsored by globalized corporations are unsustainable. For instance, "By 2025, assuming the FTAA lives up to our leaders' promises, the garbage generated in one year would completely cover all of Canada to a depth of one metre; there would be no oil left, and no trees; and our supply of fresh water would be dangerously depleted.".

The FTAA would lead to the brink of economic, social and ecological collapse. (CCPA Monitor, 9/01). Was it any wonder that desperate people from all parts of the Americas joined the Quebec Summit protest?

As to global warming, a U.N. report states that predicted increases in global warming are without precedent during the past 10,00 years. Dire warnings of the Rio and Kyoto Summits for life on earth
go unregarded, and the Kyoto Protocols requiring that industrial countries cut greenhouse gas emissions by an average of 5.2% between 2008 to 2012 are ignored by polluting businesses.

It is ironic that stress is laid upon the fact that NGO's are unelected, while unelected globalized corporations subject pressure upon elected democracies through GATT to deregulation of the most basic needs and constitutional rights of citizens. If this is quaintly regarded as progress, it is surely progress backwards- towards an age of barbarism. To go forward, perhaps the formula could be: Do No Harm.

Sue Frazer.



 

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