Creating Good Jobs for the Americas: Business and Government Perspectives

Ramón Daubón: Welcome, everybody, to the March 2005 edition of the Esquel task force, and it is a pleasure to be here. I do want to recognize and commemorate an important religious holiday, Good Friday, so though those of you to whom this day is important and managed to participate, we appreciate your participation. This is part of the Summit of the Americas in Focus series, every other monthly. This is a series of gatherings to discuss issues of the Summit of the Americas to provide a space for civil society organizations to engage government -- U.S. Government officials and others interested in the summit on the range of topics covered by the Summits.

Today we have a very special program on the main topic of the summit, "Creating Good Jobs for the Americas," but focusing on the business and government perspective. We have presentations by Ambassador John Maisto, the U.S. National Summit Coordinator, Jane Richards of the Bureau of International Labor Affairs at the U.S. Labor Department, and Adam Greene, Vice President of Labor Affairs and Corporate Responsibility at the U.S. Council for International Business.

As always, we'll go briefly around the table to just state names and affiliations of everybody so our speakers know who they are speaking with.

So, on my right:

(inaudible)

And that's everybody. Welcome everybody. As you know, this session is being webcast. It was advertised to all of the U.S. Embassies in Latin America, so we welcome those who may be watching. We will be taking questions from participants not only around the table but out there.

Just to tell us exactly what is going on, I have Alicia Edwards of the State Department on my right who will briefly tell us about this.

Alicia Edwards (Department of State): First I want to thank Rich Twigg and Mara Krier at IFES for helping us to put this together. We basically have a camera in the back of the room that's focused on our three panelists and moderator, and the camera is going to focus in on each of them as they speak and give their presentations. Folks that are watching online wherever they may be around the world can listen to their presentations as if they were watching it on a television. And there is also a module online where they can submit a question and at this computer terminal, I'll see as the questions pop up, we'll pass those to Ramon, if we get any. Recognizing that it is Good Friday, I know that there are a lot of people that are otherwise occupied, but if we get some questions, we'll pass them along. There will be an archive available online afterwards. You can go back and watch the video or read the transcript and it will be in English.

Daubón: Thank You, Alicia. Did you say around the world or advertised in Latin America?

Alicia Edwards: It was advertised in Latin America, but the nature of the Internet makes it available anywhere.

Daubón: We have brief presentations, followed by open questions and answers. We try to keep the presentations brief and lively, and I appreciate if the questions are brief and lively, to keep the conversation going. So without further ado, we go straight to Ambassador John Maisto. It is a pleasure to have you, U.S. National Summit Coordinator.

Ambassador Maisto: It is a pleasure to be here. Thanks to all of you. I'm really quite surprised to see this sort of turnout on Good Friday morning. I'm sure that there are folks who have the day off, but they are here. And I think it's a good sign to the hemisphere that, even though it is Holy Week, we are – and this is a very important year - we are working. It demonstrates some dedication to the region.

I especially want to thank the civil society task force for making all of the arrangements, and IFES once again. IFES comes through and we're all very grateful. The "Summit in Focus" series is really an important contribution in our effort to engage civil society, and of course you're all aware that we are trying something new this month, a webcast, which we’ve just heard about. So this is rather exciting, and we look forward to the dialogue.

I'm here today to give you a readout on preparations for the Fourth Summit of the Americas that Argentina will host next November. We held a meeting of the SIRG, the Summit Implementation Review Group, just two weeks ago in Buenos Aires, and it represented the beginning of the negotiations toward a declaration and toward a plan of action for the November Summit. Argentina presented a draft declaration, and distributed so-called "guidelines" for a plan of action. The Argentine government released both of the documents publicly, and you should be aware that this is an unprecedented step that I think really puts the burden on the shoulders of civil society to engage with governments as we move forward on the negotiations.

There was some thought about whether it should be done or not, and the Argentines said, let's do it. Because otherwise, people would think we're busy trying to hide something, but I assure you, this is the beginning of a negotiation process. And it's not going to be an easy one; it is not going to be an impossible one either. That's what we do for a living on the government side. And you on the civil society side will have an opportunity early on to put in your oars.

In the time that we have today, I want to do three things: I want to give you a very brief sense of our initial reaction to the Argentine draft; I want to let you know where we go from here; and I want to give you my sense of how civil society can best engage. We really believe that the Argentine draft declaration gets us off to a good start. They want to keep the declaration focused on the Summit theme of "Creating Jobs to Fight Poverty and Strengthen Democratic Governance." We support that idea. They have also told us that they see the action plan as the place to address our broader agenda, and we agree that makes sense as well. At this point, we really have no draft action plan. I want to let you know that. There are some guidelines that were set out here, but we do not have an action plan yet. And it's clear that we will need to do a lot of work. So my comments today are focused on the draft declaration. First, it's our view that the declaration must be action oriented, and forward-looking. It really serves no purpose to focus on describing problems, and decrying them. We've had a good bit of that over the years. So, we don't need to do that anymore.

So we really need to be action-oriented and forward-looking. We need to focus on solutions. All governments have to work within the realities of today, such as debt, and budget deficits and high oil prices and global forces that are beyond our collective control. But, the leaders have a lot -- an awful lot -- they can do, even given those constraints, and that should be the focus of the declaration.

Second, the most basic way to fight poverty and create jobs is to grow and to be competitive. And you'll hear this over and over. There is no getting away from it. That's the way it works. Countries that have high growth rates are also best at fighting poverty and creating jobs, and the statistics bear that out. Period. So the declaration needs to stress the central role of the private sector in job creation, and you all know that. You know the statistics. Just look at SMEs (small and medium enterprises), 80% economic activity in the hemisphere, about 60% of the jobs, that's not counting the big corporations, so it is not governments creating jobs, what it is, what we want to underline, is that we need to make clear is that the appropriate role of governments is not to create jobs but to create the conditions that promote job creation by the private sector, and to ensure that all of our people have equality of opportunity, to improve their lives, via things that, of course, permit economies to grow: quality education, vocational education, healthcare, and basic social needs. Opportunity, competitiveness and economic growth, along with good democratic governance, are also the only ways our hemisphere can truly tackle disparities and income distribution.

Third, and I'm not going to get into the statistics and comparisons, we've heard them all before. On trade, and this is important, it is our view that singling out particular sectors among the many things dealt with by our trade ministers, is not appropriate in the declaration. And we are pleased that the Argentine draft specifically recognizes the need for input from our trade ministers, on the FTAA, and other regional trade matters. What leaders say about trade -- and the FTAA in particular -- will obviously be very important.

By the time we get to November, we'll have a clearer idea of where we are going on trade, and at this point, I want to underline the importance of the Central America Free Trade Agreement, which I believe is coming up next week (in Congress).

Fourth, in our view, security is basic to being able to implement all of our Summit goals. We will be seeking language that highlights the importance of security, for individuals and their families, for communities, for cities in rural areas, for countries, and for the hemisphere - if we are to achieve sustained economic growth and job creation. And in this respect, I would direct your attention to what the President of the United States, the President of Mexico, and the Prime Minister of Canada had to say a couple of days ago in Waco. That's there's a security construct to everything that we do nowadays. And it is a reality. An example of the importance of security, with Mexico, the United States and Mexico do "Partnership for Prosperity", focused on central and southern Mexico, a public/private effort. What's the public effort as far as Mexico is concerned? And our desire to support Mexico? Infrastructure. What kind of infrastructure? There's infrastructure that receives investments from the private sector but also infrastructure that governments provide. But one of the most important parts of the infrastructure is security, because countries are not going to attract investment -- either local investment or foreign investment -- if the security situation isn't a decent one. So that enters so much into our calculations nowadays.

Finally, good democratic governance is more important in our view than the draft declaration, as it is written, currently suggests. If we are serious about creating jobs, anti-corruption, transparency, and strength in local government and decentralization, independent, efficient and credible judicial systems, and the rule of law in fiscal responsibility, among other issues, need to be prominent in this declaration. I want to stress that these reactions are preliminary, and that we really are pleased with much of what is in the Argentine draft. But clearly we have much work to do to achieve a consensus document for our leaders to consider. So, what are the next steps?

At the meeting in Buenos Aires, we agreed to move up the timetable by holding a first negotiating session in Fort Lauderdale on the margins of the General Assembly, first week of June. So, all of our governments are busy preparing detailed, written comments for the Argentines, which will then be incorporated into a second draft, for review at that session. For our part, I'm chairing an interagency process with the National Security Council involving all relevant U.S. Government agencies. Through this process, we'll develop a set of comments on each successive draft, and also develop proposals for language and commitments we believe should be on the leaders' agenda. Countries will begin a more intensive series of negotiations in September, with input coming along the way from various ministerial meetings being held this year. There are several ministerial meetings held this year and they will, in turn, be focused on the upcoming summit. Needless to say, as you can see, this is a very complex but interlocking process.

So, civil society, where does it fit in? In this first instance, civil society organizations should engage their own governments, hopefully through forums like this one and other contacts. Every country has a national summit coordinator and that person should be a first stop for any organizations with specific interests. In Argentina, I had lunch with a very prominent Argentine NGO that was very happy to hear what I had to say, and I told my Argentine friends those folks are going to be on their doorstep, as it should be -- and this is going on in other countries as well. Second, as we have done in the past, many of our SIRG meetings will have a session set aside to engage civil society. Third, many of the ministerial meetings this year will provide more focused opportunities for civil society input on summit related issues. We'll certainly be looking for civil society input for our several ministerial meetings. And of course, there will be special sessions for civil society, to craft recommendations, like the session held here last January, and the one scheduled for April 11 and 12, both organized by the Summit's Secretariat at the Organization of American States.

The April meeting is of particular interest to me because it is designed to prepare the OAS General Assembly that the United States will host at Fort Lauderdale in June. The theme for this year’s General Assembly, our hosted General Assembly, is "Delivering the Benefits of Democracy." So obviously, there is a link, a very close link between the Summit and the General Assembly this year. We see it as part of an interlocking process. I encourage you to participate in April and to join us in Fort Lauderdale in June. And I want to take this opportunity to stress that all organizations wanting to attend the General Assembly in Fort Lauderdale must send a request to the OAS Summit Secretariat no later than April 5th. And that's only ten days from now.

Please, send one. Even if you're not absolutely sure that you're going to attend, send it because we get all of the paperwork out of the way. We're in a new world, and we have to get, you know, we have to get certification and all sorts of things. There are security considerations, and we want to make sure that everybody has the opportunity to participate who wants to. Now I'll stop. I want to thank you for this opportunity, and we look forward to hearing your thoughts and views as we move toward the summit. My summit team is here today, and I’m going to take advantage of Good Friday and spend the entire time with you because I want to do a lot of listening.

Daubón: Thank you very much, Ambassador.

Ambassador Maisto: And I'm happy to take any questions that you have.

Daubón: And we'll take you up on that. Thank you for the invitation to Fort Lauderdale. Jane Richards, a pleasure to have you here from International Labor Affairs at the U.S. Labor Department.

Jane Richards: Thank you. And I want to thank everyone for being here and thanking the organizers for being here to speak on this issue today. I would like to talk about this morning are some of the initiatives that the U.S. Department of Labor has in place that are relevant to the theme of the next Summit of the Americas. Obviously, as an official of the Labor Department, we are delighted to see labor and employment issues elevated to the role of a theme in a heads of state meeting of this nature. Job creation, and in its absence, unemployment, obviously are issues that are of great concern to all of our governments throughout the hemisphere, and to all individual citizens. It makes it a very human issue.

In the U.S., as Ambassador Maisto said, we all know we look to the private sector as the engine for job creation. We see open markets, and appropriate macroeconomic structure, regulatory framework that's conducive to innovation, and entrepreneurship, and a commitment to the rule of law as all being the very necessary underpinnings to support private sector growth over the long-term, and the adoption of new technologies. But, further, within that framework, we also recognize the importance of well functioning labor markets, quality workplaces, and effective training systems and access to information systems as also being very important foundation – [laughter] is that better or worse?

As I was saying, these are very important foundations to ensure that developments in the labor and employment arena are able to keep pace then with the advancements that take place in the economic field and the technological field. Within the U.S. workforce of some 150 million workers, nearly 50 million Americans change jobs every year. To look at this a different way, researchers suggest that the average American worker can expect to change jobs eight or nine times during the course of his or her lifetime. In this very dynamic, churning labor market environment, our focus then in the U.S. has shifted away from job security, which is a term that you often hear referenced throughout the hemisphere. And we've moved more towards a notion of employability security.

So what we're focusing on the emphasis for a continuous upgrading of skills, and the acceptance on the part of workers, this need to be adaptable and to be proactive in planning your work life and your career over the course of your work life. It’s in these sorts of areas where the U.S. Department of Labor is so well positioned to contribute to the process.

The Department of Labor is not in the business of creating jobs. But rather, we see our role, as ensuring that once the jobs are created by our economy, that they are quality jobs, they are jobs that are performed and safe and quality work conditions that are consistent with the national labor requirements and norms of each government. And we also see it as our responsibility to do what we can to help workers obtain these skills that are in demand, and very dynamic economy. We don't train workers ourselves but we provide information that helps workers to obtain training. The types of labor market information that we provide to both workers and employers deals with occupations that are projected to grow, the geographic location of those occupations, the skills that are needed in order to perform those occupations and training providers who are available to provide that particular type of training.

And we're proud of the successes that we’ve had at the Labor Department. In the past four years we've seen work force fatalities drop to an all-time low in the past four years. We've also seen in just fiscal year 2004 alone, some 250,000 workers were able to recoup nearly $200 million in back wages as a result of the enforcement actions of the wage and hour division. And it was also seeing new training programs launched like the high-growth training initiative which is a partnership among governments, private sector, community colleges, to help workers obtain training and get employment in sectors that have been identified as fast-growing, and are currently facing a shortage of the qualified workers.

These are among the priorities for the Department of Labor. And our experience has been that these are also priorities for ministries of labor throughout the hemisphere. And our colleagues in these ministries are very much interested in developing their own administrative capacity to design and implement the types of programs that address the issues that I have been discussing.

The Department of Labor through our international cooperation program, works with government institutions, and NGOs and communities, globally, to promote a secure and prosperous economic system that allows workers to achieve an improved standard of living and gain greater economic security.

Between fiscal year 2000 and 2005, the Americas region alone accounted for 27% of all of the DOL technical funding that was spent. The DOL funds programs that support the improvement of working conditions, the strengthening of labor laws, programs to combat trafficking for forced labor purposes, programs that are targeted towards the development of employment systems, and development of accurate labor market information.

We also work with unions and employers and labor ministries in seven countries of the Americas, to develop programs that are creating awareness and mitigating the impacts of HIV/AIDS in the workplace.

And finally, the Department supports country efforts around the world to eliminate the worst forms of child labor. In fiscal year 2004 alone, our financial commitment to labor projects in the hemisphere amounted to close to $22 million. New child labor and education projects were begun in 2004 in Colombia, Ecuador, and Panama that targeted the worst forms of child labor for children working in hazardous commercial, agriculture sectors. Projects were also funded to address problems of child trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation and domestic work in a number of other countries in the hemisphere. And in the new regional project in Central America is the capacity of governments and civil society organizations to address the specific educational needs of children who are in the work environment.

And another aspect of child labor programs deal with child education initiatives. In 2005, we are increasing our funding to child education initiatives and these deal directly with trying to provide greater access to quality basic education for children who have been withdrawn from hazardous work environments. We’ve found this to be a very powerful intervention in terms of combating child labor. The Department of Labor actually brings a fairly unique approach to international development through our partnerships with a variety of other organizations, and through our ability to draw on the technical expertise of a number of agencies within the Department. It is important to understand that within the process of project development, that the involvement of in-country stakeholders is encouraged so that we have buy-in at the local level from businesses, NGOs and community organizations.

Over the past two to three years, we have expanded our partnerships beyond that of traditional international labor organizations, to include organizations such as UNICEF, CARE, Catholic Relief Services divisions and the Academy for Educational Development. And I'm very pleased to say that this technical assistance is yielding results. It's not just a matter of going in and providing training and leaving and never seeing anything sustained.

I’d like to share with you a few instances where we see some very tangible, real-life impacts. In Colombia, for example, a project on women's economic development has been supported through the formulation of agreements between governments and banking institutions to actually create new opportunities for credit access for women. Women participate in a business training program before they apply for the credit opportunities. And it allows them then to enter into microfinance, entrepreneurial type of relationships.

A project in El Salvador to promote the employment of disabled persons established a local training center that's actually being run by a local NGO. And after receiving training in information technologies, and basic job readiness skills, micro-enterprise types of skills, over 200 individuals have been placed in employment as a result of that project.

In Bolivia, a project on occupational safety and health yielded results in terms of 70 manufacturing factories actually adopting the recommendations that were developed during the course of the project and by the establishment of a tri-partite committee on occupational safety and health. It’s been institutionalized now in the labor ministry. So it is a more collaborative approach to improving the conditions in the workplace.

And finally, in the Caribbean, one-stop employment resource centers have been established and are in operation in eight countries, where they are linking job seekers, employers and training providers to provide for more efficient operation of labor markets in those countries.

Beyond the provision of technical assistance, the Department of Labor is also involved in the Hemispheric Labor Forum. The DOL along with officials from the Department of State represent the United States at the Inter-American Conference of Ministers of Labor. This body meets every two years at the ministerial level under the auspices of the OAS. It serves to implement all of the labor-related mandates that come out of the Summit of the Americas processes, and also provides a forum for dialogue on issues of concern and the challenges that various ministries are facing in the hemisphere. The conference is governed by a troika which consists of the current chairman of the Conference, which in this case is Brazil, the previous chair, who is Canada, and the incoming chair which is Mexico. Mexico will assume the chairmanship of this group next September when they host the next ministerial meeting. The OAS serves as the conference Secretariat and along with government officials, officials from the Inter-American Development Bank, the International Labor Organization, the Pan American Health Organization, and the Inter-American Commission for Women -- all participate in the discussions and in that way, we're able to really provide for some pretty diverse views in the discussions that take place among the government officials. It is also interesting that this body also includes participation of formal private sector advisory groups -- groups representing trade unions throughout the hemisphere, and business communities throughout the hemisphere. These advisory bodies take a very active role in the activities and discussions of the labor ministers’ process. And at the most recent labor ministerial, they adopted a joint statement which they attached to the labor ministers’ declaration.

And just so that you fully appreciate the significance of this, this is a group of very diverse trade unionists from throughout the hemisphere and a second group of very diverse business interests throughout the hemisphere coming together and agreeing not only among themselves but then across the table with each other, on what they feel the priorities are regarding labor and employment issues in the hemisphere.

We think this is a very significant accomplishment and gives great weight to the comments that they offer. The conference itself is organized into two working groups to implement its work program. Working Group One handles policy-related issues dealing with hemispheric integration and the impacts on labor. That working group is chaired by Argentina and vice-chaired by the United States. The second working group deals with more technical issues related to strengthening labor ministries, and is chaired by El Salvador and vice-chaired by Canada. Since the most recent ministerial that was held in September 2003 and hosted by Brazil, one aspect of our work program has dealt with an analysis of the labor provisions of regional integration agreements and some of the recently negotiated free trade agreements.

This has performed a very valuable function in terms of confidence-building and a fuller transparency of what's happening behind what's often perceived as very closed doors in the negotiation of agreements. Chile provided a very informative presentation. The presentation was provided both by their labor ministry and the ministry of the economy, explaining the processes of their negotiation with the United States on the Free Trade Agreement, their view of what the labor provisions entailed, and they also described the benefits not only of their economy but the benefits that they thought were accruing to the labor ministry through the labor cooperation mechanism of the agreement itself.

This was followed by presentations from Costa Rica regarding their agreement with Canada, and also presentations by Guatemala regarding the negotiations on the FTA with the U.S. Ministers have also been encouraged to consult with other ministry officials within our capitols at home.

We see this as a way to improve policy development, and recent efforts in the conference brought together ministries of health along with ministries of labor. And at our upcoming working group meetings in April, the Government of Argentina is organizing a session with their Ministry of Economy, where we will further explore the relationships between economic policy development and labor policies. These are two areas that cannot be done in isolation. There are implications across both, and a more coordinated approach would yield synergies and better results. This interagency communication was also reinforced more recently by the OAS as a very desirable way to provide input into the Summit of the Americas process. The Summit theme then is creating a very special opportunity for the ministers of labor of the hemisphere to showcase the important functions performed by our ministries, and to support job creation and assert that job creation and the creation of good jobs leads to the improvement of standards of living of all of our citizens, which is the goal that's ultimately shared by all of us.

Our work program over the past few years has provided very fertile ground for identifying some of the most significant challenges that are faced by our countries: the existence of a large informal sector; high-youth unemployment; lack of credible statistical data; just to name a few of the issues that we're grappling with. And the obstacles faced by the ministries themselves in terms of in terms of inadequate budgets, high staff turnover, lack of political will to support some of the initiatives of labor ministries.

The task now as Ambassador Maisto was referring to is, to develop recommendations for solutions to these problems -- recommendations then that will be put forward to our labor ministers for their endorsement in September, and then subsequently forwarded for the consideration by heads of state at the Summit in November. So it will be a challenge, and this goal is what will guide our discussions at the upcoming meeting in April. In terms of input of civil society and NGOs into the process, again -- through the Summit Office -- there is a very appropriate vehicle through events such as this, and the Department of Labor has an open door. We're happy to hear the ideas of the people who are on the ground. Our experience in developing programs in the U.S. is that the best ideas come from the private sector and the workers themselves so we're very much interested in any thoughts you have.

Thank you.

Daubón: Thank you, Jane. And moving right along, Adam Greene of the Office of Labor Affairs and Corporate Responsibility at the U.S. Council for International Business.

Adam Greene: Thank you. Ten minutes?

Good morning. As was indicated, I'm responsible for labor affairs and corporate responsibility for the U.S. Council for International Business. It’s my first involvement in the Focus series so I'm happy to be here. If you don't -- if you are not familiar with the Council for International Business, I'll just explain in a few sentences. We are a U.S. membership organization, multi-sectoral, with members of companies, professional firms like law firms and accounting firms, and other associations, either sectoral or otherwise. And so, we have about 3/5 of the Fortune 500 in our membership in the company base, and then additional associations and professional firms. We are the affiliate to three international business networks. One is the International Chamber Of Commerce, which works throughout the U.N. system, and the WTO. Another is the International Organization of Employers, which represents the primary employer organizations in about 130 countries, and works primarily obviously in social policy and labor issues, and is the business arm of the International Labor Organization, which is tri-partite if you are not familiar with it. It’s government, labor and business. And the last is the Business and Industry Advisory Committee to the OECD which works with the 30 OECD countries.

Also as mentioned, involved in the Business Technical Advisory Committee on Labor Matters, which is the business advisory group to the Inter-American Conference of Labor Ministers. So we've been participating in that process as well. Just in terms of the context of the discussion here in terms of promoting job growth, in addition to the obvious notion that it is the theme of the Summit, I think something that needs to be mentioned is the end of the multi-fiber agreement, particularly as it relates to job growth in Central America with the elimination of tariffs on textiles, which is already having a pretty significant impact in the Central American economies, and will probably have increasing impact in bigger degrees in certain countries.

But the question that was posed, and I tried to stick with it, is how to sustain economic growth in order to promote job creation, and increase incomes across a broader swath of society. And I have to firmly echo what was already said is that, in order to generate jobs, you have to have economic growth. And it is really focusing on, as a governmental policy matter, focusing on the framework to create economic growth that will lead to job creation. And some key messages that I hope I will support in my comments, that's the first -- that you need to focus on growth to lead to jobs.

The second is, in the Western Hemisphere, unfortunately, there is a lot of room for improvement. There's a long way to go. The positive spin on that is that we haven't used all of the tools in the tool box. There are many things that can be tried that haven't been tried. So we have not exhausted all of our options here. In fact, we barely scratched the surface. So there are many things that will be done to promote economic growth that really haven't been tackled in the Western Hemisphere. So as I say, our options have not won out. And the third is that while I will talk about some of the trade linkages, the primary focus has to be on domestic reform.

And that domestic economic growth will support and lead to the international trade integration and support that, but, without that, without domestic reform, the trade openings really won't have the desired effect and Mexico is a good example of trade openings that were not followed by internal reforms either in the labor market or capital markets or information markets, infrastructure development, et cetera. And I'm going to orient my remarks in terms of the things that can be done around the World Bank and IFC report on doing business, which sets out, you know, the message that we have to hear from the private sector in terms of looking at the things that we think are important, actually came from the World Bank and the government side. So obviously, it doesn't matter where the good thinking comes from, it's supporting it. But they’ve -- and if you haven't gone through this analysis, I recommend it to you because you can go through country by country, item by item, and start searching out for indicators. And they’re based on several indicators of the ease of doing business, in terms of promoting economic growth is at the core of what we're talking about: related to starting a business, hiring and firing workers, registering property, enforcing contracts, getting credit, protecting investors, and closing the business from start to finish in terms of starting up and closing a business.

In the Western Hemisphere, other than the U.S. and Canada, no other country in the Western Hemisphere is in the top 20 in terms of the overall metric of these indicators. It takes 70 days to start a business, on average, in the Western Hemisphere, outside the U.S. and Canada as opposed to 63 days on average in sub-Saharan Africa and five days in the U.S. The best is seven days, which is in Puerto Rico and the worst is 203 days to start a business in Haiti.

The firing costs on average in the rest of the hemisphere average 70 weeks. The cost of firing is 70 weeks, which relates to 59 in sub-Sahara Africa and in the U.S. In Puerto Rico, the number was zero. The highest is 170 weeks in Guatemala. So obviously, with that impact of firing somebody, the probability that you're going to hire with any degree of ease is fairly limited. It takes 56 days to register a property on average in the Western Hemisphere, related to 114 in sub-Saharan Africa and 12 in the U.S. and again, the best is 21 days in Ecuador and the worst 195 days in Haiti.

But, in indicator after indicator, in each of these seven categories, there are sub-indicators that are broken out. The countries in the Western Hemisphere compare poorly on almost every factor. So this is -- this isn't, and this relates to the governmental framework. In many cases, we're not talking about less regulation. In some cases, it needs more regulation – protecting property rights requires more regulation -- and in some cases, it is actual enforcement of the laws that are there that is needed. But, in other cases, it does require getting the same impact from a regulation but doing it in a way that's much more efficient, less bureaucratic, less costly in terms of time and actual resources.

The key findings that they came up on that relate specifically to this notion of job growth in the Western Hemisphere, are the poor countries face much larger regulatory burdens than rich countries on average, three times and half the protection of property rights, which relates to the ability to grow a business, so basically, countries that need the most help set up the most burdens. Heavy regulation and weak property rights exclude, this is the second point, exclude the poor from doing business. Forty percent of the economy is informal in countries with performance in these areas. Women, the young, and low-skilled are hurt the most. There is a direct correlation between the ease of doing business, and the size of the informal economy. Meaning, if it is easy to do business, the informal economy is much smaller. If it is difficult to do business, it is obviously much higher. And the same is true for women, the chair of women in private sector employment in terms of labor market rigidity.

The third is that, the payoff of reform is huge. That by some estimates, the increased economic growth, 2% a year by improving on these seven indicator areas, and that the cost of instituting the reforms isn't huge in many cases. They are regulatory steps of reducing the number of procedures it takes to start a business from, say, 17 to 5, and the number of days from 50 to 20 that free up a lot of time and attention to actually running the business instead of dealing with the bureaucracy. And obviously, it is this notion of driving organizations to companies and individuals into the informal economy that is the real problem in terms of creating so many different obstacles to setting up a business because if it is too difficult, and too time-consuming, it is simply not worth it.

And it is impossible for someone trying to run a business with two or three people to spend eight hours a day for 50 days sitting in some registry office so they go into the informal economy. Even in some cases where efforts are made to legalize businesses, if the reforms are not taken up to support this, it slips right back into the informal economy, property starts changing hands off the records. Building on this, is some points that have been mentioned in terms of the investment framework -- the overall government regulatory framework and political framework.

A study done, a survey of 26,000 firms in 53 countries listed -- in order of importance of business owners -- the barriers to increased investment and they ticked off ones that wouldn't be a surprise to anybody: policy uncertainty, macroeconomic instability, high tax rating, corruption, cost and access to finance, crime, regulations, skills, or the lack of skills, courts, difficulties with the courts and legal systems, lack of electricity, labor regulations. So you can see, labor regulation is already down to the 10th item so these aren't the main barriers. Transportation, access to land and telecommunications.

And then obviously, and this is where I think the business community and civil society and labor groups have a fairly common position which is just simply the need for effective corruption-free democratic political systems, access with respect to the rule of law, and impartial judiciary, recognition Of enforcement of basic property rights and contractual obligations, because they obviously have to go hand-in-hand. More financial systems, capital mobility, labor market flexibility and human resources development. In the absence of just -- it isn't difficult to list these things. What is difficult is implementing them. But that's really where when I said, the key will be domestic reform that is going to be the key because the answer, the correct answer in any one of these areas is going to be different in any particular country. It is going to have to be, in the court system or in property rights registries, they'll be different, correct answers for different countries. I've been given two minutes.

So the other areas that I would mention is, relating to the support for doing business, is support for entrepreneurship. And there're some characteristics of entrepreneurship that lend themselves particularly to the other areas we've been talking about in terms of women and youth. Actually, in this area, Peru, Ecuador and Brazil are among the countries with the highest entrepreneurial activity in the world, around forty percent or even higher. Young people tend to be more involved in entrepreneurial activity.

There is a gender gap whereby two-thirds of entrepreneurs are men, as opposed to one-third of women. That's something that needs to be addressed. But the relationship between entrepreneurial activity and education is high in high-income countries but low in low-income countries, which means that there is an opportunity to really get into the area.

And there is this dynamic within entrepreneurial activity where there is obviously a high dropout rate, but there is a higher startup rate. So the net is -- there is a net increase that should be supported. And I'll just close by reiterating support for the Central America Free Trade Agreement because, for two main reasons -- one, it builds on and in some ways, supports domestic reform, partly by the areas within the agreement that open up the economy and provide incentives for increased productivity and competitiveness within the other countries. But also, the process of going through these negotiations leads to reform. In terms of labor particularly, there are three main tracks that have been followed. One are the reforms that have been discussed and agreed during the negotiations; labor market reforms in the CAFTA countries during the negotiations; the text itself, and then the capacity-building discussions that follow along after it. So there is a lot more going on than just simply what's in the text, and it’s this process of reform that I think is different in some ways in the way CAFTA has been approached than say, what was done with NAFTA.

There’s fairly clear recognition, a correct recognition that the trade agreement standing on its own may not last or really create the effects that were sought -- just one piece of a process. And actually, a never-ending process in terms of some of these reforms. Just to go back, loop back as a close to the final point, the countries that are leading reformers in this World Bank study on doing business are some of the most efficiently-regulated countries in the world. But they continue to make changes to reduce the regulatory burdens of doing business. So there is no point to stop. But, there is a huge amount to start in the Western Hemisphere that can lead to economic growth and job creation.

Thanks.

Ramón Daubón: Thank you, Adam. Let me make a brief commentary to get the conversation going. Ambassador Maisto mentioned small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and the fact is that in all countries, particularly even in developed countries, SMEs generate most of the jobs. And I was at a conference last week at the Woodrow Wilson Center and someone pointed out one visualizes the economies of a train on tracks being pull by a locomotive and said the national economy is a train on wheels asks not being pulled by a locomotive, it is being pushed by the caboose. It’s the caboose that does the pushing and the job of the locomotive is to steer. And it’s a powerful image that in a sense, the Summit is a meeting of engines of locomotives and the question is how can they steer so the caboose when it pushes makes life easy for the caboose, so that it can actually use all that energy that the caboose generates. And I think we should realize and mention that, and the market failure, the market that fails because of things that markets require are not functioning. The fact that you exclude the poor, as you say, from the markets, that is a market failure. The reason, the question is why does the market fail, and you mentioned three of the seven.

I could summarize that some are infrastructure, the fact that you don’t have electricity, et cetera, well, engines do that. They provide the electricity, the World Bank gives loans for that kind of stuff. Or there is legal and regulatory which, of course, the engine can’t provide the legal and regulatory framework -- but there is one we tend to ignore and it is the cultural attitude. A cultural disease but also not just the poor who have the disease, everybody has the disease. The fact is that if you are the wrong color or the wrong gender and you do not get along, the problem is both yours and the lender.

The fact that you cannot walk into a bank and get a loan regardless how good the idea is for the business, that's a market failure. It is not just the poor that are sick. The poor have the symptoms of the underdevelopment but the disease affects everybody. And we have to deal with that. And the national governments, what can the engines do to make people realize that it is a disease of the whole community. So, we're open for questions. We have one microphone here so I ask you, in the room, to speak up and speak slowly so we can get your voice clearly, especially for the transcriber.

Question: Thank you very much, this is a fascinating discussion. I have two brief comments. I was delighted to hear Ambassador Maisto say that the United States is going to emphasis emphasize security. Survey after survey in Latin American countries has indicated that for the populace at large, the two principle concerns are jobs and security. And the two go together because job creation without security is extremely difficult, if not impossible. Secondly, I’d like to announce the formation of the Indigenous Enterprise Institute which is dedicating to disseminating the experience of the native peoples of Alaska who have gone from poverty to wealth in 30 years through ownership, employment and the creation of businesses, and, I might add, without the opening of a single casino. Among the groups of and elsewhere in Latin America, and this is quite new, one of the partners is the former ambassador of Ecuador to the United States. And we are looking forward to cooperating with many other groups including some of them that are represented here today in this task. Thank you very much.

Daubón: Excellent.

Question: Ambassador Maisto, the question is that, in the draft is there any mention to workers' participation? And my question is related to the fact that during the top of the crisis in Argentina a few years ago, several enterprises, at the edge of bankruptcy, they turn the ownership or they invite to become owners, partners of the workers and there were several examples. And I understand they were successful. So, I would like to know if the Argentine government is considering that event, that possibility.

Ambassador Maisto: I don't have the draft in front of me. Somebody, Steve Liston, David Hults, do you recall right off the top of your head if there was an explicit reference to workers' participation?

Steve Liston (Department of State): Not in that way. I don't think there is anything in terms of – my expectation is that issue would not be dealt with in terms of declaration but might be in the plan of action. We just haven't gotten into that level of detail yet. Presumably it is something that's on the agenda elsewhere. It came up last time.

David Hults (Department of State): Yes, there is a reference being in the form of social dialogue as part of the decent work agenda, the International Labor Organization.

Jane Richards: That would create an opportunity for workers to have some input, and also, I just wanted to mention that on the fringes of the most recent -- they jointly organized a seminar for the business and trade union advisory groups, to allow them to come together, and to discuss technology and innovation and decent work issues and at that point to also agree to a dialogue, a document of principles that they think should be highlighted. This creates an opportunity for both of the private sector groups to have some input into the Summit deliberation process. This again is very unique.

Daubón: I have a question in the back and then here.

(inaudible)

Question: I’m very interested where you encouraged us, to send representatives, et cetera. The idea of sending civil society representatives and I'm pleased to see the Summit again, strengthening local government. We're very engaged in supporting partnerships and the local governance and civil society and we are supporting a conference in July. Some of that planning committee, it might be useful for some of them to go and present some of the things that we're supporting and they are supporting which is the hemispheric initiative. How can we get the RSVP? Maybe the Esquel Group can send that information to us on how we can RSVP by April 5.

Ambassador Maisto: Steve Liston, would you care to go into that? Or Jane Thery?

Jane Thery (Organization of American States): You could send a letter to the Secretary by April 5th, requesting to participate in the General Assembly. And it is, all this is on our website which is http://www.oas.org/ or under http://www.summit-americas.org/.

Question: We could share that. The other thing is, if we could get access to that World Bank report.

Greene: Google "Doing Business," it has a home page of its own.

Question: Doing Business?

Greene: Doing Business.

Question: One more quick question for Jane. You mentioned working with local NGOs in El Salvador and very important thing. Were those direct grants from Labor to these local NGOs or did they go through CARE?

Richards: That's generally the case that we worked with a larger scale implementer and they do contracts at the local level.

Daubón: Okay, great, thank you.

Question: Regarding the challenge of implementation of the Summit, is there any thought as to how the mechanisms of implementation could be strengthened? The impression that I get is, every four years, there is an event, some structure, perhaps we can do more than that. Perhaps, let's say, mechanisms or accountability where – the countries.

Ambassador Maisto: Sure.

Question: Can we not do better in structuring something that and at the same time ensure accountability? (Inaudible)

Ambassador Maisto: I’m so happy you touched on this point. This is what we attempted to begin at the extraordinary Summit in Monterrey -- precisely that. There the declaration called for, and the leaders agreed to specific objectives in three areas, with specific timetables. And it was -- we had a devil of a time negotiating those specific timetables because countries do not want to be held accountable. But we did it with regard to -- let's tick them off. Steve, why don't you tick them off?

Liston: We had -- there is a commitment to reduce the time and cost of starting a business, significantly.

Ambassador Maisto: Because we couldn't get 50%.

Liston: We couldn't get 50%, significantly by the next…

Ambassador Maisto: We understand significantly to be 50%.

Liston: … by 2005. By the next Summit which is in November. There was a commitment to triple the amount of credit going to small and medium-sized enterprises through the IDB by 2007.

Ambassador Maisto: Through financial institutions -- very important.

Liston: Through financial institutions -- private financial institutions in the region. There was a commitment to reduce by half the cost of remittance transfers by 2008, and we're well on the way to do that. A lot of that Department of Treasury is working on and they have spoken to this group about how they are working on that commitment. And there was a commitment to take concrete steps to strengthen property rights by the next Summit of the Americas in each country. Now, that's one area. There was also all of those needed, by the next Summit in 2005, 86,000 people got antiretroviral treatment for HIV/AIDS.

Ambassador Maisto: That's a PAHO (Pan American Health Organization) number.

Liston: And I think we're on the way to meeting that goal. And there was a commitment to produce a report on the education system in each country with the idea of helping people to understand what kind of thing needs to be done and distributing that report so people could use it. So that was the first step in terms of accountability on education -- in terms of accountability.

Ambassador Maisto: Parents, teachers, administrators, to decentralize a way to get a handle on the whole education structure.

Liston: And there was a commitment to deny safe havens to corrupt officials, to those who corrupt them, and to their assets in the hemisphere. And all of those commitments are being worked on through the various enterprises, through all of the organizations, the IDB, and of course, the governments at the ministerial level. So those mandates have been worked on. It is partly the job of civil society to say whether those had been done or not and how far –

Ambassador Maisto: Right.

Daubón: Two questions in the back, I believe, one there, and one afterwards. Speak up so the microphone -- could you stand up?

Question: Inter-Agency Consultation on Race in Latin America. We are housed at the Inter-American Dialogue. Yes.

I guess one of my questions is for Ambassador Maisto and the second question I think could be addressed by (inaudible) representatives from the OAS and other organizations involved in this, is that some of our institutions, member institutions, mainly the – have come out and shown that one of the great impediments to wealth in the region and one of the issues in the labor market more specifically has to do with ethnic and racial inequality. I guess my question is, to what extent is the Summit going to address that issue, looking at labor markets and looking at creating jobs in a broader way for Latin Americans. And our work is more specifically in Afro-Latin communities -- we work with civil society representatives. And the second part, I guess is that in the civil society process of the Summit, to what extent are these organizations being consulted or participating.

Daubón: Exclusion by reason of race is a failure of the market. I think it is something that we need to hammer on strongly. Ambassador, do you want to address that?

Ambassador Maisto: Well, very good point, Ramón. There is a lot of concern and a lot of attention being paid to the subject of inequality across the board. Now, how you attack it, and social class reasons, there are racial reasons, there are ethnic reasons, et cetera. And we get into some very interesting discussions on this subject. I don't know exactly how it is going to come out in the declaration. It will be addressed. But, your point is a very, very good one. We need the participation among the civil society organizations of Afro-Latino groups country by country and I suspect that we're going to get them. But we'll know -- we'll know it if it we see it manifested in what each country comes up with. An interesting observation here, the views of the Caribbean countries, where you have in many of them primarily black populations and black leadership who don't view the problem in exactly the same way. So we have to -- that has to enter into how we as a hemisphere approach it, but I think we're getting, I think your remark is a good one, Ramón, and we're talking about equality of opportunity that transcends the gender and race and ethnicity, et cetera. And if we keep our eye on that ball, we will be advancing but we have an awful long way to go. But the pressure should come. If it doesn't come, it won't be addressed.

Greene: I just want to add one thing. In my standard list of government framework that's necessary in terms of rule of law, I normally have anti-discrimination, and I somehow left it out. But in addition to being, to the extent social failure and market failure, it is a failure of the court system because if a country is going to institute laws on anti-discrimination, access to judiciary and a court system that can back that up, it is a contract issue. If the courts are viable, you have access to recourse to judicial system that could give you impartial hearings. So it is not -- it is a case where the courts in some countries, and it happened in the U.S. where the courts are out in front of society. And the society caught up. But, we base that on a court system. And a lot of countries where the courts aren't adequate or highly corrupted, it is never going to function in the way it should.

Daubón: So it is all woven together. Is it on this same topic? Because I have another waiting in the back.

Thery: To respond to her question. There are two mechanisms at the OAS that you should try to engage to get your groups into the process and into the dialogue. In addition to just going to the General Assembly of the OAS in Fort Lauderdale, there is also a mechanism to register your organization at the Organization of the American States. And if you go through that process, which is again on our website, you have to put in the information about your organization, who your membership is, et cetera, but then you'll receive all of the documents that are under negotiation in the OAS system. The other thing is what we're trying to do, and with generous support from the U.S. Government, is to try to have travel grants for people to come from smaller NGOs and smaller countries to participate in the ministerial processes, like the labor ministerial, the education ministerial process, for example, so they can be in the room for these discussions.

Daubón: Thank you. Alan.

Question: Yes, I work at the State Department on anti-corruption issues and I appreciate the fact that you raised the relative importance of domestic reform and international trade agreements because it seems to me that a lot depends on the economic growth and getting investment on domestic reforms but what is your council doing to help to promote domestic reforms or what can the business community do (inaudible)?

Greene: Well, I was going to mention in terms of the call for social dialogue and inclusion of groups outside, other than government in terms of these domestic frameworks, because each solution, it seems from the experience to date, every solution is going to have to be tailored country by country. There is no set format. So, given the national network that we have through the International Organization of Employees and the business groups and those, which is overlapping, the 34 members of the IOE in the Western Hemisphere are (inaudible) what was discussed. We have fairly extensive conversations among those groups about these kinds of efforts and in some cases, it is encouraging them to an openness to social dialogue that there may not be a huge comfort with, and in many cases the issue of domestic reforms related to the informal economy, to be frank there is a status quo of formality that people are comfortable with, and happy with. If you happen to be in the formal sector, you understand how it works and where a payment here or there can get things done. And upsetting that apple cart is not universally supported in any sector. The primary, because the solution that to be national is to work through not the national business groups, in dialogue with labor organizations and civil society, to create, basically just enough -- I mean, I don't know how many years you have to keep saying the same thing over again. But it's -- [ laughter ] at least you get the sense that it is beginning to sink in. That there is much wider agreement in terms of these accountability measures -- coming home to say, okay, this is what's going to matter. This is what will ease things up and get things going.

Question: Partly answered with my central concern, when the initial debates occurred ten or 12 years ago on establishing NAFTA and then more recently, AFTA, the labor and environmental proponents including civil society were to my view, largely excluded from the discussions, at least their concerns were given second place, let’s be kind. And this is caused a number of those groups including, I don't know how many representatives here, to be continually concerned with the race to the bottom -- the fact that you did not have adequate or full concern about the ability of labor to organize, the ability of those concerned with the environment to have a serious input into most of the discussion, has meant that there will be abuses. And to deny that would be, I think, naive and silly. I see your business group has taken that issue as one of concern, but, we still have some ghastly examples – the border industries in Mexico, the fly-by-night enterprises in Central America which seriously exploit workers. And a great many examples of misuse of the environment, oil exploitation in the Amazon and so forth. To what degree would you say that the anticipated new code, if you want to think of it that way, is this dialogue, these upcoming discussions are going to be addressing the most egregious examples. Examples of the effects? They are easy targets to those who oppose the trade agreements. And what's being done to face down those problems?

Greene: It is a good question. I'll give you my construct in terms of the race to the bottom. In terms of lowering legal standards, there isn't one. The standards are there. The ILO did a study of the Central American countries and followed up with the American republic against all of the fundamentals principles of rights at work. The legislation was, I mean, in some cases, need to be tweaked but the legislation by and large is good. And that's the case in a lot of areas. On paper, the laws are there and nobody is lowering laws to attract investment or to gain advantage. The problem is, obviously the laws are not enforced, they’re not implemented or enforced with any degree of consistency or balance. And so, in terms of the relationship to trade, if you step back and take a look at the bigger picture of the current situation, the laws are not being enforced already anywhere. So this isn't a trade issue per se, it is the fact that if you look at a particular countries, if there is not consistent enforcement, it is going to hit the export sector as well as the domestic sector. In many cases, the domestic sector is far larger than the export sector. And on the flip side, the investment coming in is more likely to be formal and legally compliant than, say, the domestic sector. So the relationship of, I mean, the trade agreements aren't creating an avenue for people who are trying to avoid laws. The people coming into those countries, as I say, are more likely to be formal and more likely to be complying with the law. The domestic sector is the larger piece where the non-compliance is greater, to a greater extent. And so the solution isn't in my view going to come through the trade agreements, it is going to come through the domestic reform that increases implementation and enforcement across the entire economy, regardless of whether you are producing for the domestic sector or the export market. Because that's the only way it is going to cover everything.

Question: But there is leverage.

Greene: As I say, it is support. It is one of the reasons we support the free trade agreement is that there is this leverage through the negotiations. To be frank, there is considerable unhappiness in the CAFTA countries about the requests that have been made, and pretty loud cries. We're finished and we're done and then we're back, we'd like you to do this, this. From their side, and from the business side and the community in the Central American countries, I mean, they have been crying uncle for six months and they are still crying uncle but it is still going, because it offers an opportunity for growth that supports their goals, domestically. But it is not easy for them, but as you said, it is leverage and it has been used by the U.S. Government quite successfully, I think. I hope that answers your questions.

Daubón: Five minutes after the hour and I'll ask the speakers to make some parting comments.

Richards: I would like to add to what Adam was saying about the recently-negotiated free trade agreements. In each of these agreements there is an enforceable commitment for each country to enforce the labor laws that are in place. And that is exactly the problem as Adam was mentioning, about there are cases where the laws essentially are not bad. Maybe not perfect but they are there. There’s still a great lack of enforcement due to lack of resources, due to the corruption, whatever. As part of each of the free trade agreements, there is an annex that deals specifically with labor cooperation issues that are to take place to address specifically some of the compliance. In the context of the CAFTA agreement, the United States has funded a project that is now looking at ways to help ministries of labor improve their inspections directorate, the case management systems for example; a greater use of alternative dispute resolution to address alleged violations before they move into the court system -- once they are in the court system, they are there for years.

And also, another complaint that was raised repeatedly by not only the government sectors but the private sector, when they were interviewed on these issues is a lack of information about exactly what the laws are and if there is a perceived violation what mechanisms are available in order to try to address that issue. So, we are working with the labor ministries on all of these issues, and the response from labor ministers is that the free trade agreements have created an excellent opportunity to raise the problems that they deal with to a higher political level and finally get the attention and the resources to deal with the problems.

Ambassador Maisto: I would just say enforcement in individual countries requires political will in individual countries. And what Jane just said about the opportunity that the trade agreements provide is absolutely right on. This is going to be a very important year in hemispheric relations, one of the most important years in comparison to other years that you could think of. With the beginning of the Bush Administration, the progress that we've made on the trade side, the combination of the General Assembly and the Summits of the Americas grappling with real issues, goals, timeframes, and the whole trade agenda, Central America has been talking about integration for -- those of us who have been in the business, you know, they've been talking about it for decades. But it’s been all words. The only thing that is forging Central American integration right now is CAFTA. And it must -- it must be a success. Because, building on the Chilean agreement, and building on NAFTA as we go forward, CAFTA, what’s being negotiated with the country, we move to a Free Trade Area of the Americas and that's where the Summit process started. And that is the objective of this administration, strong objective. And I think that it's the objective of a solid bipartisan group in this country that thinks about these things.

So that's why all of this is important. And along with it comes the democracy infrastructure of the Inter-American system as contained in the Inter-American Democratic Charter, which also requires political will on the part of the member states to apply to provide the political democratic structure for all of this. It all fits. It’s all there. We don't have to invent anything new on the democracy side we don't have to invent anything new on the social side.

There is a debate going on about a social charter. It’s all there. Again, it's applying what we have. Action plans based on what we have, and it goes back to political will, country by country. And that's where you all come in. Because political will requires pressure often, and that's what democratic systems are all about and that's why you are also important.

Daubón: Someone mentioned that the laws in Nicaragua are quite similar to the laws in New Zealand. For some reason they work in New Zealand. So again, we've approached the witching hour, and it is a pleasure to have you all here, to those who participated by webcast, to the civil society task force, IFES -- we wish to thank them for the organization for their hospitality as always. And we wish to thank our co-sponsors, the Esquel Foundation, Inter-American Dialogue, Council of the Americas and the U.S. National Summit Coordination. We have announcements, a couple of announcements. Partners of the Americas has an announcement, right here.

Question: I’m Jason from Partners of the Americas and I want to announce an effort, this is a unique effort for civil society, broadening and deepening the consultation within the Summit process. It’s unique because it is an effort being driven by civil society and for civil society. It is an effort looking at the current Summit theme, vis-a-vis eight different sub-themes which are important to that theme: labor, and transparency and anti-corruption, hemispheric security, peace building, citizen participation, education, indigenous peoples. And what we're doing is organizing virtual deliberations around these themes being led by experts on these themes. Partners is working with 14 other organizations from seven countries throughout the hemisphere. These deliberations are being launched in about a week and a half, April 4. It is a five-week virtual deliberation, part of a larger process. And I encourage everybody in this room and everybody who is watching via webcast to register and sign up. This is open to civil society organizations. The website is http://foroscumbres.redinter.org/default.aspx?culture=en-US, and more information is available on Partners of the Americas website which is http://www.partners.net/.

The goal of these forums is to generate concrete strategies for the implementation of Summit Mandates, and to broaden the scope of civil society participation. A unique thing is we have a virtual library where past Summit commitments will be available and other information as pertains to these eight different themes and I would also like to thank the Summit Secretariat office for their help in the effort too.