North American leaders defended the 14-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement at an annual summit on Monday, fending off criticism by candidates in the U.S. presidential primaries that NAFTA costs American jobs. On the first of the annual two-day NAFTA summit, held this year in New Orleans, free trade was at the forefront for President Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Mexican President Felipe Calderon. "I assured the prime minister that I'm a strong advocate for free trade. I believe it's in our nation's interest that we continue to have a free-trade agreement," Bush said after a meeting with Harper. Calderon acknowledged the fierce debate over trade in the U.S. election but he argued that the positive effects of NAFTA were widely neglected. Calderon said opponents of NAFTA do not realize how many jobs have been created or to what extent immigration from Mexico has dropped as a result of the agreement. "I stress this issue because recently NAFTA has come under criticism and I do not believe that people are realizing how many benefits NAFTA has brought both to the United States and Mexico," Reuters quoted Calderon as saying.
Democratic presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have appealed for the support of U.S. labor by promising to renegotiate or possibly abandon the unpopular NAFTA, arguing that the trade pact is a major factor behind the loss of roughly 3 million U.S. manufacturing jobs since 2000.
Journal of Commerce
