Letter from members of Congress to secretary Paul O'Neil of the US Treasury regarding the IMF/World Bank's intervention in the Mozambique cashew nut industry.
Dear Secretary O'Neill:
As you are no doubt aware, in the last several years Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle have become increasingly dissatisfied with the policies promoted and imposed by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in developing countries, using U.S. tax dollars.
One particular case stands out: for the last several years, the IMF and the World Bank have undermined Mozambique s efforts to rehabilitate its cashew nut processing industry. As a result, thousands of workers have lost their jobs in an industry that was once one of the largest private sector employers. Production has shifted to India, which uses child labor to shell the nuts. Ironically, the United States is a major market for processed cashew, so that as a result of the IMF/World Bank intervention, U.S. consumers are subsidizing child labor. For years the World Bank persisted in pressuring Mozambique to remove support for its cashew industry, despite opposition to the World Bank policy by Mozambique s democratically elected parliament and despite the fact that a study commissioned by the World Bank indicated that the World Bank s policy was unsound.
Last year, the new head of the IMF, Horst Köhler, promised that IMF policies would change, that the IMF would stop imposing policies on developing countries that have nothing to do with the IMF s core mission.
Unfortunately, like so much rhetoric in the past concerning reform at the international financial institutions, it is far from clear that the change in rhetoric has been matched by a change in reality. Recent reports indicate that the IMF is still pressuring Mozambique to remove support for its cashew industry.
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We regard the IMF s continued obstruction of Mozambique s democratically determined economic development policies to be an abuse of the authority and resources granted to the IMF by the United States. We ask you to instruct the United States Executive Directors at the IMF and the World Bank to communicate that it is the policy of the United States that the IMF and the World Bank should cease obstructing Mozambique s efforts to rehabilitate its cashew industry.
Please keep us apprised of your efforts in this regard.
Sincerely,
Cynthia McKinney Bernie Sanders Member of Congress Member of Congress
Peter DeFazio Lane Evans Member of Congress Member of Congress
Rob Andrews Eleanor Holmes-Norton Member of Congress Member of Congress
Julia Carson Dennis Kucinich Member of Congress Member of Congress
Barbara Lee Danny K. Davis Member of Congress Member of Congress
Bob Filner Albert Wynn Member of Congress Member of Congress
Maxine Waters William Lacy Clay Member of Congress Member of Congress
David Bonior Donald Payne Member of Congress Member of Congress
Earl Hillard Jan Schakowsky Member of Congress Member of Congress
Bennie Thompson Tammy Baldwin Member of Congress Member of Congress
Neil Abercrombie Member of Congress
