EU to blame for Cambodian land grab?

[geovalin]

Farmers in Cambodia say a European free trade initiative, set up to boost their national economy, has forced them off their land. They say that big multinationals are now taking over the local sugar industry.

The Everything but Arms program is an EU initiative designed to help developing economies integrate into the global economy. In Cambodia, the policy has sought to abolish tariffs on sugar in order to promote the country's domestic sugar industry, help create jobs and raise living standards.

But critics say, since the start of the program, the Cambodian government has begun leasing land to foreign sugar companies and evicting farmers who had run the sugar farms for generations. The issue, known as landgrabbing, is often criticized by NGOs worldwide and occurs regularly across Asia.

After failing to regain titles to their land through the Cambodian legal system, 400 farming families are now suing one of the multinationals involved - Tate and Lyle - in London’s High Court, claiming that the sugar it bought from Cambodia was grown illegally.

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http://www.dw.de/eu-to-blame-for-cambodian-land-grab/av-17363130

[geovalin]

EU resolution passed against sugar abuses

Kevin Ponniah

The European Parliament has passed a resolution calling on the bloc’s executive body to urgently act on an EU preferential trade scheme found to have carried high risks of human rights violations in Cambodia through land evictions for industrial sugar development.

In a January 16 resolution, EU parliamentarians called on the European Commission “to act, as a matter of urgency, on the findings of the recent human rights impact assessment of the functioning of the EU’s Everything But Arms (EBA) initiative in Cambodia”.

It also asks the commission to consider obligating exporters seeking to take advantage of EBA privileges “to testify that they have not evicted people from their land and homes without adequate compensation”.

The resolution is the latest missive from the EU parliament on the long-standing issue, following a similar resolution in October 2012 that called on the commission to investigate human rights abuses by EU-exporting sugar companies and withdraw trade preferences if abuses were found. In May last year, top EU officials said the situation was under “close review” but did not agree to an investigation or to withdraw preferences until certain legal conditions were met.

In response, Equitable Cambodia and Inclusive Development International (IDI), two NGOs that have long lobbied the EU on the issue, produced their own human rights impact assessment of the scheme, which found that the EBA carried “risks of devastating human rights impacts”.

David Pred, managing associate at IDI, said yesterday that the resolution was a “clear call to action” by the only democratically elected EU body.

“We are hopeful that it will not be dismissed once again by the bureaucrats in Brussels,” he said.

EU Ambassador Jean-François Cautain said yesterday that the parliamentary resolution was “yet another strong signal that the topic is high in EU institutions”, adding that the EU had taken note of the human rights impact assessment and was considering possible responses.

http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/eu-resolution-passed-against-sugar-abuses