• Gender impacts

Gender impacts of trade liberalisation

This study analyses the direct effects of trade liberalisation on the life of Jamaica’s poor. In order to so it uses the so-called Trade Impact Review (TIR), an economic tool developed by the Women’s edge coalition to assess the impact of trade on Jamaica’s poor.

The general outcome of the study is that women are the most negatively affected by the consequences of trade liberalisation. This is a very important insight, as it could help in forecasting the potential effects of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), on Jamaicans living in poverty, particularly women.

The specific findings of the study include:

• although macroeconomic policies may have improved Jamaica’s economy in the late 1990s, since then, poverty rates have increased and are predicted to soar
• small farmers, many of them women, in the poultry and dairy sectors had to compete with the influx of cheaper, imported products which harmed small and large producers alike
• trade liberalisation caused women to lose jobs overall, while men gained jobs
• only few well-paid jobs are available for women without skills and an education.

In light of the forthcoming FTAA, the study strongly favours another Trade Impact Review to be conducted before the FTAA is completed.

Furthermore the study urges the US to:

• implement the international trade adjustment assistance programmes that would allocate funds to create training, education, and development initiatives targeted at sectors in other countries that may be adversely affected by trade liberalisation
• to review its agreement with Food for the Poor and adjust its donations of milk powder to the number of people receiving food stamps in Jamaica.Jamaica, for its part, should:
  • use government procurement policies to promote economic development within the country
  • press for strong Special Products (SP) and Special Safeguard Mechanisms (SSM) in the WTO and in the FTAA to enable developing countries to select special products that would not be subject to tariff cuts and the SSM and could be used to counter import surges
  • adopt a Tariff Rate Quota system to review milk powder imports in relation to locally produced milk and place a tariff on imports above a certain amount.

  With regards to the legal and regulatory specifications of the FTAA, both countries should:

  • exempt health care, basic education, water, and electricity delivery from services negotiations
  • remove elimination of performance requirements from text
  • include special provisions for women and minority-owned businesses
  • strengthen the respect for labour rights.
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