What is the Trans Pacific Partnership?
Tuesday, June 30,2015AsemconnectVietnam - If you have any doubt that the TPP trade agreement is misunderstood, just ask your representative: have you read all 29 chapters yet? If they had, they would have learned the following.
1. Food Safety - According to the TPP, transnational companies can sue our states or federal government if our food safety laws stand in the way of expected future profits, then only the tribunal has to decide between keeping our food safe or allowing the multinational company to sell tainted food.
2. Fracking - Under the TPP, the Department of Energy would have no authority to regulate natural gas that is produced for export. Our environmental laws will be helpless to protect our water table against fracking companies that sell to member nations. "The TPP...could mean automatic approval of liquid natural gas (LNG) export permits--without any review or consideration--to TPP countries," writes the Sierra Club. Japan is the largest importer of LNG. This is why, in a September, 2013 visit to Japan to attend the G20 summit, Obama remarked "I know that Japanese Prime Minister Abe is committed, as we are, to completing this year's negotiations around the Trans-Pacific Partnership." Through the process of drilling wells, sloppy fracking practices have allowed cancer-causing contaminants into the water table and caused a host of health problems for local residents. The Breast Cancer Fund's website warns: "Fracking fluids can contain chemicals linked to breast cancer, including known and suspected carcinogens such as benzene and toluene, and endocrine-disrupting compounds such as the phthalate DEHP."
3. Banking - The U.S. Business Coalition for the TPP includes banking firms such as Citi, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs. Their objective through the TPP is to prevent any regulations that would hamper the continued unregulated practices of the banking industry.
4. Drug Prices - The TPP extends patents on medications to 20 years, and if pharmaceutical companies tweak the formulation of a drug, they can extend that patent another 20 years, delaying cost-saving generics from entering the market to save lives. Doctors in Japan are worried that the continual rise in costs will threaten their healthcare system.
5. Internet Freedom - The TPP imposes similar restrictions to SOPA (The Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act). Currently, if you download a recipe from a website and print it, it's free. But if the TPP passes, then you may be assessed a fine of up to ten thousand dollars for violating copyright laws.
2. Fracking - Under the TPP, the Department of Energy would have no authority to regulate natural gas that is produced for export. Our environmental laws will be helpless to protect our water table against fracking companies that sell to member nations. "The TPP...could mean automatic approval of liquid natural gas (LNG) export permits--without any review or consideration--to TPP countries," writes the Sierra Club. Japan is the largest importer of LNG. This is why, in a September, 2013 visit to Japan to attend the G20 summit, Obama remarked "I know that Japanese Prime Minister Abe is committed, as we are, to completing this year's negotiations around the Trans-Pacific Partnership." Through the process of drilling wells, sloppy fracking practices have allowed cancer-causing contaminants into the water table and caused a host of health problems for local residents. The Breast Cancer Fund's website warns: "Fracking fluids can contain chemicals linked to breast cancer, including known and suspected carcinogens such as benzene and toluene, and endocrine-disrupting compounds such as the phthalate DEHP."
3. Banking - The U.S. Business Coalition for the TPP includes banking firms such as Citi, Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs. Their objective through the TPP is to prevent any regulations that would hamper the continued unregulated practices of the banking industry.
4. Drug Prices - The TPP extends patents on medications to 20 years, and if pharmaceutical companies tweak the formulation of a drug, they can extend that patent another 20 years, delaying cost-saving generics from entering the market to save lives. Doctors in Japan are worried that the continual rise in costs will threaten their healthcare system.
5. Internet Freedom - The TPP imposes similar restrictions to SOPA (The Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act). Currently, if you download a recipe from a website and print it, it's free. But if the TPP passes, then you may be assessed a fine of up to ten thousand dollars for violating copyright laws.
Source: bloomberg.com
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