Codex being voted in the USA starting next week
Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 10:35 pm
One week before vote to Save our Natural Supplement Access
An effort by big pharmaceutical companies to gradually eliminate their
"competition" (vitamins, minerals, herbs and other natural supplements) and create
dependence on their companies has just won a huge victory in Germany. "How
does this affect me?" you may ask. Well, if the House of Representatives passes
CAFTA (Central America Free Trade Agreement - passed in the Senate already),
which is up for vote any time after July 11, 2005 (next week), Codex will
become the law of the land in the US and we will loose all the hard won advances of
the last few years to protect our access to natural supplements (by inclusion
of the WTO in the CAFTA agreement, and WTO requires the "globalization" of
all natural supplements - ie. elimination and severe restriction).
Please take a moment to read the following and contact your Representative
(link below) and ask them to vote NO on CAFTA and send it back to be rewritten
without forcing us to accept Codex's decisions in this country. Thank you for
listening and acting.
Jamie
Urgent Press Release
National Health Federation Urgent Alert - CAFTA
July 2, 2005
URGENT ALERT
ACT NOW
YOUR HEALTH FREEDOM IS BEING THREATENED
CAFTA VOTE - 1 WEEK AWAY
WE MUST NOT ALLOW CAFTA AND CODEX TO OVERRIDE DSHEA
The Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) Treaty will require the
U.S., a member of the World Trade Organization, to revise our food laws and
regulations based on Codex decisions. CAFTA would force harmonization of our
dietary supplements and regulations to international standards, overriding the DSHEA
Act of 1994.
The Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) and the even-broader Free
Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA) are both modelled after the North
American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). These agreements are typical bureaucratic
monstrosities of “managed” trade that masquerade as free trade and would expand
NAFTA to include first Central America and then the rest of the Americas in an
economic “union.” True free trade would take a few pages of written text to
enact (“eliminate these barriers to trade and these tariffs,” etc.); all
three of these agreements encompass thousands of pages of bureaucratic textual
garbage sprinkled liberally with rules, regulations, and special-interest
benefits.
Buried in the language of CAFTA is Section 6 that would require of all its
members that they form a Sanitary and Phyto-Sanitary (SPS) committee for the
purpose of insuring ongoing harmonization under the terms of the SPS Agreement in
the World Trade Organization (WTO). You can find that text at the following
website:
http://www.ustr.gov/Trade_Agreements/Bi ... Texts/Sect
ion_Index.html.
If you then look at Article 3 of the WTO’s SPS Agreement, you will read the
following words: "To harmonize sanitary and phytosanitary measures on as wide a
basis as possible, Members shall base their food safety measures on
international standards, guidelines or recommendations." (emphasis added) And as you
all know by now, Codex sets the international standards for food safety
including vitamins & minerals.
So, CAFTA, which is set for a vote in the House of Representatives when they
reconvene July 11th, 2005, is another critical link by which health-freedom
haters hope to bypass the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994
and obligate the United States and Canada by treaty to harmonize to the harshly
restrictive Codex vitamin-and-mineral standards. They cannot be allowed to
succeed, and we at the NHF completely oppose these two treaties that would put a
knife in the back of our health freedoms.
*********************
~CAFTA has already passed the Senate in a 54 to 45 vote on July 1st, 2005.
~Legislators have just recessed for one week, reconvening July 11, 2005.
~IMPORTANT- For House consideration, when they return, the Senate Bill 1307
(click here to view bill), ratifying CAFTA, can be voted on without going to
committee. It is on the House calendar and may be brought up at any time.
*********************
ONLY ONE WEEK TO ACT. CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES. URGE THEM TO VOTE
AGAINST CAFTA NOW.
YOUR LETTERS WILL MAKE A DIFFERENCE. THE VOTING IN THE HOUSE WILL BE CLOSE.
WE HAVE ONE WEEK TO FLOOD THEIR OFFICES WITH CAFTA OPPOSITION LETTERS.
PLEASE JOIN IN THIS EFFORT AND CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES.
Contact any member of the House of Representatives via
http://www.house.gov/writerep/
Click here for Petition Opposition Letter.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
An effort by big pharmaceutical companies to gradually eliminate their
"competition" (vitamins, minerals, herbs and other natural supplements) and create
dependence on their companies has just won a huge victory in Germany. "How
does this affect me?" you may ask. Well, if the House of Representatives passes
CAFTA (Central America Free Trade Agreement - passed in the Senate already),
which is up for vote any time after July 11, 2005 (next week), Codex will
become the law of the land in the US and we will loose all the hard won advances of
the last few years to protect our access to natural supplements (by inclusion
of the WTO in the CAFTA agreement, and WTO requires the "globalization" of
all natural supplements - ie. elimination and severe restriction).
Please take a moment to read the following and contact your Representative
(link below) and ask them to vote NO on CAFTA and send it back to be rewritten
without forcing us to accept Codex's decisions in this country. Thank you for
listening and acting.
Jamie
Urgent Press Release
National Health Federation Urgent Alert - CAFTA
July 2, 2005
URGENT ALERT
ACT NOW
YOUR HEALTH FREEDOM IS BEING THREATENED
CAFTA VOTE - 1 WEEK AWAY
WE MUST NOT ALLOW CAFTA AND CODEX TO OVERRIDE DSHEA
The Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) Treaty will require the
U.S., a member of the World Trade Organization, to revise our food laws and
regulations based on Codex decisions. CAFTA would force harmonization of our
dietary supplements and regulations to international standards, overriding the DSHEA
Act of 1994.
The Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) and the even-broader Free
Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA) are both modelled after the North
American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). These agreements are typical bureaucratic
monstrosities of “managed” trade that masquerade as free trade and would expand
NAFTA to include first Central America and then the rest of the Americas in an
economic “union.” True free trade would take a few pages of written text to
enact (“eliminate these barriers to trade and these tariffs,” etc.); all
three of these agreements encompass thousands of pages of bureaucratic textual
garbage sprinkled liberally with rules, regulations, and special-interest
benefits.
Buried in the language of CAFTA is Section 6 that would require of all its
members that they form a Sanitary and Phyto-Sanitary (SPS) committee for the
purpose of insuring ongoing harmonization under the terms of the SPS Agreement in
the World Trade Organization (WTO). You can find that text at the following
website:
http://www.ustr.gov/Trade_Agreements/Bi ... Texts/Sect
ion_Index.html.
If you then look at Article 3 of the WTO’s SPS Agreement, you will read the
following words: "To harmonize sanitary and phytosanitary measures on as wide a
basis as possible, Members shall base their food safety measures on
international standards, guidelines or recommendations." (emphasis added) And as you
all know by now, Codex sets the international standards for food safety
including vitamins & minerals.
So, CAFTA, which is set for a vote in the House of Representatives when they
reconvene July 11th, 2005, is another critical link by which health-freedom
haters hope to bypass the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994
and obligate the United States and Canada by treaty to harmonize to the harshly
restrictive Codex vitamin-and-mineral standards. They cannot be allowed to
succeed, and we at the NHF completely oppose these two treaties that would put a
knife in the back of our health freedoms.
*********************
~CAFTA has already passed the Senate in a 54 to 45 vote on July 1st, 2005.
~Legislators have just recessed for one week, reconvening July 11, 2005.
~IMPORTANT- For House consideration, when they return, the Senate Bill 1307
(click here to view bill), ratifying CAFTA, can be voted on without going to
committee. It is on the House calendar and may be brought up at any time.
*********************
ONLY ONE WEEK TO ACT. CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES. URGE THEM TO VOTE
AGAINST CAFTA NOW.
YOUR LETTERS WILL MAKE A DIFFERENCE. THE VOTING IN THE HOUSE WILL BE CLOSE.
WE HAVE ONE WEEK TO FLOOD THEIR OFFICES WITH CAFTA OPPOSITION LETTERS.
PLEASE JOIN IN THIS EFFORT AND CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES.
Contact any member of the House of Representatives via
http://www.house.gov/writerep/
Click here for Petition Opposition Letter.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]