The following is an article by the GI's Alex Singleton in the August 7th issue of The Business, the European business newspaper.

It has been a great few days for supporters of global free trade, despite the best efforts of reactionary forces in the United States, Britain and Brussels. The Central American Free Trade Agreement, which extends open markets to six nations plus the US, passed in the House of Representatives, defeating the sugar producers and trade unions that fought desperately against it.

In the crucial House vote, only 15 out of 202 Democrats voted for the trade agreement, and it was carried by a wafer-thin majority of two votes, but the end result was nevertheless a big victory for free trade. The agreement was also passed in the Senate and has now been signed into law; its main beneficiaries will be ordinary people in Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the US, who will enjoy faster economic growth in the long term, more jobs and better living standards.