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Well the example given, the fanjuls, is pretty interesting because they are NOT family farmers, they are exiled Cubans and considered among the wealthiest men in Dominican Republic. Their company is a multinational, they are not simply domestic producers.

Also, another politician supporting CAFTA, Charles Rangel, is pandering to the Dominicans that live in his district. They are using the CAFTA to lower remittance fees when they send US dollars out of country.

Their contributions to the White house have paid off, it appears the multinational interests are getting the trade deal written expressly for them. It clearly isn't about "opening markets" its about subsidizing the multinational isn't it? By including the "dominican accord' in CAFTA, this multinational is set up to do very well and hurt domestic producers. They will be able to bring their own sugar in for processing, raising the import quota to accomodate them.

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The Dominican accord is now set to be rolled into one reached earlier between the U.S. and five Central American nations: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. Adding the island nation will help build political support, Zoellick said. More than 1 million Dominicans live in the U.S., according to U.S. Census Bureau data

Helpful Support

Their backing may help the Central American accord win approval in Congress. The agreement is opposed by Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, labor unions and sugar growers. Republican leaders have said it is unlikely to be voted on this year.

Representative Charles Rangel, the top Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, said the announcement makes this ``a historic day for U.S. relations with the Dominican Republic.''

His congressional district includes the Dominican neighborhood of Washington Heights in New York City. The agreement may help lower the fees for money that U.S. residents send to their families back home.(which is exactly what we saw with NAFTA, and we learned this encourages illegal immigration and also props up corrupt governments in the home country because the money flowing in contributes significantly to otherwise disfunctional economies)

The Dominican Republic, with 8 million people, has $9 billion a year in trade with the U.S., and is the 39th largest export market for U.S. companies, according to the Commerce Department.

Eighty percent of U.S. exports of industrial and consumer goods will enter the Dominican Republic duty-free once the agreement receives congressional approval. Tariffs on most U.S. farm products will be phased out over 15 years, with half of U.S. agriculture goods getting duty free entry immediately.

Intellectual Property, Worker Rights

The agreement also locks in rules for government contracts, safeguarding of patents and protection of workers' rights.

``This is going to help trade, but it's also going to help us be more transparent, strengthen our labor laws and give our business leaders the chance to invest with Americans,'' (in other words buy off our politicians like the Fanjuls did?)Guzman said. Guzman was in Washington to wrap up 10 days of negotiations.

U.S. sugar growers say that increased sugar imports threaten to put them out of business. Once this deal goes into effect, Dominican sugar growers(the Fanjuls perhaps?) will be able to export 10,000 tons more of sugar to the U.S.

Zoellick said the Dominican sugar provisions will be less controversial because Flo-Sun Incorporated, which is run by the Fanjul family in Florida, has sugar production in Florida and the Dominican Republic. Spokesmen for Flo-Sun and the American Sugar Alliance didn't return telephone calls.

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000086&sid=aHJRYYvvw3Fw&refer=latin_america

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"Free trade" is about allowing multinational corporations to put domestic producers out of business. Here is a very clear example of how it works.