In Mexico, 100,000 protest NAFTA

But in the U.S., who cares?

The following article is over two weeks old, but the fact that it has just come to our attention indicates how poorly the U.S. media is doing at covering substantial issues in our neighboring country to the south. If there were a protest attracting 100,000 people in the U.S., it would be breaking news on all the major networks and splashed across the front page of every newspaper in the country.

While this article states that over 100,000 Mexican citizens participated in this protest, others indicate the number could be as high as 300,000 while the Mexican police says the figure was only 20-25,000.

Thousands in Mexico Urge Government to Renegotiate NAFTA

By Julieta Mendoza, International Business Times
Posted 02 February 2008 @ 10:25 pm EST

Tens of thousands of agricultural workers and their union representatives gathered at Mexico City's downtown plaza, the Zocalo, on Thursday to complain about the agriculture provisions in the North America Free Trade Agreement between Canada, the United States and Mexico.

Agricultural workers with tractors, cows and banners — estimated over 100,000 by media reports — came together, urging the Mexican government to renegotiate the rules in the agricultural part of the Agreement that do away with customs tariffs for corn, beans, sugar and milk starting in 2008.

"We have lost our way as a nation. We have given up sovereignty over food and energy," said Cruz Lopez, the speaker of the National Agricultural workers Confederation (CNC for its acronym in Spanish) according to Spain daily ABC.

Different organizations representing land workers said rules in NAFTA will diminish competition in Mexico, mainly affecting farmers. They also asserted that the U.S. has better agricultural financial assistance than Mexico.

The rest is here. Yes, the protest was mentioned on CNN and AP, but it was more widely covered in France, the UK, China, Iran and Cuba. Not that all U.S. media outlets totally ignored the story. One that featured it was the North Platte, Neb., Bulletin.

Thanks to Minnesota Central for the tip.