MEDIA REACTION ON CAFTA, MAY 20, 2005

UNCLAS TEGUCIGALPA 001091 SIPDIS DEPT. FOR WHA/PD; IIP/G/WHA DIPASQUALE; AND IIP/T/ES DEPT. FOR EB/TPP DCLUNE, WHA/EPSC AND WHA/CEN DEPT. PASS USTR E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: OIIP KPAO ETRD HO USTR SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION ON CAFTA, MAY 20, 2005 ¶1. Op-ed in San Pedro Sula-based liberal daily "La Prensa" on 5/20 by Tulio Mariano Gonzalez, entitled "With or without CAFTA, Honduras lives." "The Caribbean Basin Initiative is a preliminary step in the long road towards CAFTA-DR, characterized essentially as a space for free investment, which is believed may become an apparently free market." "Free commerce is a reality: opposing it is dumb and stubborn, it is also less intelligent to bet all in favor of this procedure which the majority of U.S. congressmen don't support." "There are a lot of indicators that reflect agricultural deterioration, tendency toward behavioral change and high consumption of yellow corn. The urban population grows faster than the rural, and the social sector factories failed due to the `geniuses' that promoted the Agriculture Modernization Law." "The truth about free trade treaties is that they are not development strategies, they are financial openness. We can't forget the competition that will exist between these poor countries to access the leftovers of the northern market." "Therefore, it's imperative to create the necessary conditions to take an advantage of the benefit of the trends. Afterwards, irreversibly, the time will come to overcome the minor and basic characteristics of free trade to converge in the free circulation of people, to overcome the asymmetries with equity, thus reaching a fare trade and a prosperous world." Palmer