Interview
with Bishop Juan Alberto
Cardona - Methodist Church
of Colombia
Bishop Juan Alberto Cardona leads the Methodist Church of Colombia and is strongly involved in two ecumenical groups that work on human rights issues. The "Red Ecumenica" (Ecumenical Network) which brings together several Colombian churches for common work for justice, peace and in support of Colombia's 3.7 million internally displaced people; and the Commission of Restoration, Life and Peace of Council of Evangelical and Protestant Churches of Colombia (CEDECOL). Both networks are partners of KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives. Read recent media coverage here.
Q: Can you, in your own words, describe the nature and
extent of poverty in Colombia?
A: Poverty is a huge problem in Colombia. 70%
of people are in poverty and 50% in extreme poverty. There is
a high rate of unemployment, particularly in the cities, which
is increasing every day. It is caused by migration from rural
areas fleeing violence. There is also a lot of informal unemployment,
that is, people selling things by the side of the road to try
to get enough money to earn enough to eat, or shelter for the
night -- but not working at their full potential. In rural areas,
there's enormous poverty as well.
The nature of poverty differs by regions. In the cattle region,
in the coastal area of the North, peasant farmers had land that
was taken from them by cattle ranchers. These peasants were prevented
from growing their crops. Instead, the cattle farmers hired them
as paid labour, where they earned a little cash making food for
export or for the wealthy.
On the Pacific coast, on the other hand, people were forced off
their land to grow palm oil, which is used for cooking. However,
Palm oil dries out the land. Peasants once again lost their land,
and had no work -- and the soil was harmed, impacting the ability
to grow crops in the future.
In the coffee-growing areas, there was a pest called the Coffee
Berry Borer that killed a lot of coffee plants. Because so many
plants were affected, many farmers had to cut down coffee plants
and try out other crops. However, it was only the largest farmers
that could survive the huge economic loss involved in the end
of these plants, since starting up new crops and new exports meant
investment in new seeds, machinery, and waiting for the plants
to bear fruit. Once again, the small farmers lost their land because
they could not finance adjustment, while the big landlords have
been able to sustain themselves.
Education is another big issue. There is very little education
in rural areas and virtually no way to acquire skills to improve
their agricultural practices and so the poor can't compete with
larger farmers who know the most modern methods, and have the
best equipment. To export your products overseas, and earn money
this way, the products have to be of very good quality -- and
the smaller and poorer farmers don't have the knowledge or the
machinery to produce at this level of quality standards. So any
trade deal that is to reduce poverty has to think about how to
make sure the poor can participate and get up to the high levels
of quality and international standards.
These small farmers sell their products in markets alongside
big landlords, who produce in large quantities and have much lower
costs of production. The large landlords then push the small ones
out of business. There are no government programs for small farmers
in Colombia. And there's clearly little concern about them in
many parts of the country.
Q: How do human rights violations affect poverty in Colombia?
A: People in rural areas are frequently threatened
by armed groups, which make their lives more insecure. This worsens
poverty, and induces people to migrate to the city. But often
there are no jobs waiting for them.
Conflict, human rights violations, corruption and poverty are
tightly linked. Violence, the failure of public services because
of corruption, and human rights violations worsens the situation
of the poor.
Q: How would a trade deal between Canada and Colombia
affect the poor in Colombia?
A: What
is most important for
a small-scale farmer
is his land. If you lose
your land after a natural
resource company comes
in and takes it, the
person is destroyed morally,
psychologically, and
the fabric of the family
is changed. The family
is then used for cheap
labour by the corporation
or large landowner. The
quality of life goes
down, because the farmer
can't exploit his land
for himself and the needs
of his family, and survival
becomes dependent on
the cash economy -- which
can be fragile. The benefit
for the economy is minimal,
because the workers earn
little, don't learn much,
and their standard of
living goes down.
It would be better if there was a deal that provided for children's
well-being, food security, and employment, but this is an ideal.
Our conditions are of extreme poverty. Any policy is changed by
this fact.
For example, some politicians came up with a program where they
would give a farmer some money if the farmer took land out of
growing illegal drug crops. This money was meant as an incentive
to induce small farmers to stop growing illegal crops and it was
meant to pay for the costs of starting production in another crop.
Farmers had never seen that kind of money before, so they jumped
on the deal, took the money, and destroyed their drug crop. But
what they found was that they money didn't last very long -- in
fact, the money was quite small. This small grant of money couldn't
compensate for the fact that 1 hectare of coca will earn you a
lot more in the market than plantains or similar crops that were
planted in their place. Plantains [a kind of banana], for example,
are sold by the farmer to the middleman, who then sells them in
the market. The farmer earns a very small part of what the consumer
actually pays. The government program, by throwing a small amount
of money at farmers, can't change the fact that farmers participate
very unequally in commodity chains and don't earn enough to get
out of poverty. Trade rules need to change this.
Small farmers don't have the technology to peel, wash and dry
coffee -- but large farms do. Canada could look at mechanisms
to make peasant farmers earn fair money for their work and ensuring
trade goes along with education and health care. But this would
be a different kind of deal, a deal with social elements.
Technical assistance is needed for small farmers if they are
to take advantage of trade opportunities, and not lose out.
Another example: cattle producers might have 1000 heads, have
technology to make milk. The costs are minimal. The small farmer
who does the milking by hand finds it very expensive to incorporate
Canadian standards into production. For this reasons, a free trade
agreement with Canada should involve technology transfer to all
small groups to allow them to compete and to support them -- like
through health insurance for family farmers. The current Colombian
health program for the poor, SISBEN, has really horrible service,
mainly because it doesn't have any money to pay for medicines
and basic equipment. It creates an illusion that the government
is helping the poor, but in fact it's creating a problem.
There is a specific case of someone in a rural area who was bitten
by a snake. SISBEN wanted to charge them for the vaccine, but
since the person didn't have money, they went to the church to
ask for money to buy the vaccine, syringe, and everything. Corrupt
politicians rob the money that is destined to this program. By
the time all the levels of government take their share, there's
nothing left. People then have to pay to get health care -- and
often don't have the money.
The government uses an agreement like this one with Canada as
an umbrella. They say "we're getting results" -- but
behind that they're standing on the backs of the poor. It benefits
the corporations in Canada, the rich in Colombia, but it ignores
the poor.
Q: Do you have an example of how an average family might
experience international trade, and how it could affect their
poverty?
A: There
are places in Colombia
where they make shoes.
The whole family works
in a small workshop.
Now earlier, about a
decade ago, it would
just be the father and
maybe the mother making
shoes mainly for the
local people or for others
in the region in Colombia.
What's happening now
is that whole families
are getting involved
making shoes to send
to Canada. Big corporations
buy shoes from these
small workshops, placing
huge orders that families
get excited about. They
get excited because they
have so much work, so
many shoes to produce,
and get everyone involved
to make as many shoes
as possible.
But while before they might earn like $10 per pair of shoes,
they're earning about $5 a pair of shoes now. So although the
quantity produced has increased a lot, say by 50%, in fact they're
earning less because the per-unit price is lower. This kind of
production makes people into machines. The whole family produces,
but at half price, and in bad conditions. The exporter then earns
lots of money when they sell to a Canadian retailer, but producers
earn very little. When I was visiting some of these workshops,
I asked people why they were letting themselves be fooled. They
said they were happy to be working. But poverty has increased,
like in Mexico for the Maquiladoras.
Everyone's making shoes in these places, but no one's going to
school. A child who should be encouraged to improve themselves
has been told that if you want to eat, you have to work. The rich
then say that it's the mentality of the poor that prevents them
from moving up, that they don't want to get ahead. In fact they're
too busy working to get food to eat. Any trade deal has to come
to terms with these realities and decrease the exploitation that's
happening here to make sure the lot of the poor isn't made worse
off.
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