Request for Endorsement: Sign-on Letter on WTO Mini-ministerial Meeting in India

Dear APC members and friends,

This September 3-4, India will host a “mini-Ministerial” meeting dubbed "Ministerial meeting on Re-Energizing Doha: A Commitment to Development" in an effort to break the impasse towards concluding the Doha Round of World Trade Organization (WTO) expansion. Ministers from only a few dozen countries have been invited; and we understand that the meeting will be focused on, but not limited to, agricultural negotiations. Indian farmers, trade unions, and other economic justice advocates have called for a national mobilization to protest this activity, particularly in light of the ongoing Food Crisis.

In response to this exclusionary meeting, and to support the efforts of the Indian civil society and peoples' movement, the Agriculture Working Group of the Our World Is Not For Sale (OWINFS) network - of which APC is part of -- has developed this (attached) sign-on letter to Ministers for which we ask your organization’s endorsement.

The sign-on letter with initial signatories includes APC and APVVU.

Could you please reply by August 31, 2009 to APC secretariat at apc_secretariat@yahoo.com AND Sharl Ortiz at sharl47@yahoo.com (with copy to roda_g04@yahoo.com )?

Feel free to forward it from you instead of using my signature line if that is more appropriate!

Thanks,

Rhoda Gueta
Coordinator
APC Secretariat