Come to the Meetting on 11/11 to Link the Mexican and American Anti-Wal-Mart Movements

I am writing on behalf of Global Exchange and the Frente Nacional Contra Wal-Mart to invite you to a meeting in Mexico City on Saturday, November 11th. The goal of the meeting is to bring together anti-Wal-Mart activists from Mexico and the U.S. to discuss how to intensify Wal-Mart activism in Mexico and improve collaboration between the two countries. Your expertise on Wal-Mart will prove invaluable at this meeting, so I really hope you can make it.

Background Information on Wal-Mart in Mexico

Wal-Mart of Mexico, Wal-Mex, is the second largest Wal-Mart in the world, with 828 retail outlets throughout the country. As in the United States, Wal-Mart is the largest private sector employer in Mexico. It has some 130,000 paid employees as well as tens of thousands of unpaid employees. Just like in the U.S., Wal-Mart is also the largest vendor of food in Mexico with sales of more than six billion dollars.

Mexicans have been organizing against Wal-Mart for years, though their efforts have mostly been local and under-resourced. The most well known fight against Wal-Mex was the one in Teotihuacán, where Wal-Mart built a store a mile away from one of the most well known archeological sites in Mexico. Recently the anti-Wal-Mart organizing efforts in Mexico have amplified, as the Partido de la Revolución Democratica (PRD) announced that it will boycott Wal-Mart because of the company’s involvement in the recent contested presidential election. The PRD had a demonstration inside the 22 Wal-Mart Super Centers in Mexico City last Sunday, September 24, 2006.

Meeting Details

The meeting in Mexico City will bring together activists, labor organizers, academics and others who are organizing against Wal-Mart in Mexico with their allies from the United States to share information, develop strategy and improve coordination. Mexican groups that are expected to attend the meeting are AMAP, STRACC, Frente Autentico del Trabajo, CECCAM, and many others . U.S. groups that have been invited to send representatives include Wal-Mart Watch, International Labor Rights Fund, Big Box Collaborative, Change to Win, ACORN.

The meeting will take place on Saturday, November 11th from 10 AM to 4 PM at the Hotel Sevilla, Serapio Rendon 124, in Mexico City http://www.gsevilla.com.mx/sevilla/esp/ . For international guests attending the meeting and staying overnight, discounted rooms at the Hotel Sevilla are available for 30 to 55 U.S. dollars. Please contact me to make reservations.

I will be following up this email with a phone call next week to find out if you’re able to attend the meeting. I hope you agree that this is a great opportunity to improve international coordination as we struggle against the harmful practices of this huge international corporation.

Sincerely,

Ruben Garcia
Program Coordinator
Global Exchange
415-279-3174
ruben@igc.org