Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (shown) will meet with President Trump next week for the fourth round of NAFTA talks scheduled for October 11-15, 2017 in Washington, D.C.

As previously reported in The New American, Canada is pushing for progressive changes to NAFTA, which President Trump has previously labeled as the “worst trade deal” ever signed, and has even threatened to withdraw from unless he could renegotiate a “better” deal.

“Personally, I don’t think we can make a deal because we have been so badly taken advantage of,” President Trump said at a rally in Phoenix on August 22 regarding the renegotiation of NAFTA. “They [Canada and Mexico] have made such great deals — both of the countries, but particularly Mexico — that I don’t think we can make a deal. So I think we’ll end up probably terminating NAFTA at some point.”

Canada’s far-reaching progressive demands include strengthening existing labor standards and safeguards, abolishing U.S. right-to-work laws, adding new chapters on the rights of indigenous peoples and gender equality, toughening environmental standards, and addressing global warming/climate change.

Regarding the new “gender” chapters that Canada seeks to add to NAFTA, Canada’s ruling Liberal Party wants, according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) News, a “feminist North America Free Trade Agreement.”

Although the text of this proposed gender chapter remains secretive, it is said to be “modeled after the gender chapter the Liberal government added to its free trade deal with Chile,” according to the CBC News report. This refers to the 1997 bilateral free-trade agreement between Canada and Chile known as the Canada-Chile Free Trade Agreement (CCFTA).

In June, Prime Minister Trudeau and Chilean President Michelle Bachelet of the Socialist Party of Chile “modernized” the CCFTA by adding a chapter on trade and gender.

The CCFTA is now the second FTA in the world to include women and girls as essential components to long-term economic development. The chapter also reaffirmed both Canada and Chile’s preexisting commitments to United Nations and other international agreements on gender rights.

Article N bis-02 of the CCFTA’s new trade and gender chapter reads:

https://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/north-america/item/27054-canada-wants-a-progressive-nafta-to-promote-agenda-21-2030