Newsletters Nyéléni in English

The international Nyéléni newsletter is the voice of the international movement for Food Sovereignty. Its main goal is to strengthen the grassroots of the movement, by providing accessible material on key issues and creating a space – for individuals and organisations involved in the struggle – to exchange their experiences and share information.

Voices from the field

Newsletter no 23 - Food justice and food sovereignty in USA

Voices from the field 1

Food Justice 2.0

LaDonna Redmond, Founder and executive director of The Campaign for Food Justice Now

I became a food activist because my son Wade developed food allergies at a very early age and I wanted to get the healthiest food I could for him. I really wasn’t any different from any other mother in my community. I wanted the best for my son. But that food—the best food—was not available in my neighborhood on the west side of Chicago. I live in a community where I can get a semiautomatic weapon quicker than I can get a tomato. The public health issue of violence is connected to the public health issue of chronic diet-related diseases.

For me food justice 2.0 is really about the narratives of people of color. The food justice movement tells the story of colonialism and the impact of historical trauma on communities of color.

We understand that the importation of African slaves to the United States provided the labor for what we now call our industrial food system. At the core of what I believe to be the problems in our community, particularly when we talk about the accumulation of wealth or the lack of health, is really a conversation around slavery. We have not reconciled the event of slavery or its impact. For us, food justice is not just about nutrition. It’s not just about growing the food. It’s about dignity. It’s about being visible.

We can be successful if we’re able to recognize that we have never had a just food system in the U.S. and we must join together and create a narrative where all of us can sit around a table and create the food system that we need. Reclaim your kitchens. Reclaim your stove and your table. Cook your food. Make your food. Know where your food comes from.”

Adapted from “Food + Justice = Democracy” presentation at TEDxManhattan, 2013.

Voices from the field 2

Community empowerment and resilience in Detroit

Malik Yakini, Founder and executive director of the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network

In Detroit, we currently have a population of about 700,000 people, which is down from 1,900,000. The city has been considerably depopulated as a result of the decline of the automobile industry and both the 1950s and 1960s white flight and more recently, black middle-class flight. We have massive unemployment, which is estimated to be anywhere between 18 and 20 percent. There are no major grocery store chains in Detroit. That leaves the majority of the population to get their food from gas stations and convenience stores. Much of the so-called food in those stores is in Styrofoam containers, boxes, and packages. The geographic footprint of the city is about 143 sq. miles. Of that 143 sq. miles, about one third of the city is vacant due to the depopulation and also the intentional disinvestment in the city of Detroit.

The reality of it is that Detroit and Detroiters are being spanked. And one of the reasons we’re being spanked is because of the 50 year and beyond struggle for black empowerment in the city of Detroit. About 80 percent of the city’s population is African American and we live in a metropolitan area that is one of the most highly racially polarized areas in the United States. We are now seeing many urban areas throughout Detroit being gentrified. We see young white hipsters moving into the core of the city and we see long-time residents being displaced. All of this is happening against the backdrop of one of the most insidious things that has happened in the United States and that is that the elected officials of Detroit have been disempowered by the appointment of an emergency manager by the governor of the state of Michigan. Effectively, the vote of the people of Detroit has been taken away.

Our organization has been working towards community empowerment and resilience. We are also concerned about creating democracy, the type of democracy where people are actually making decisions that impact their own communities and their own lives…We are fighting all of these struggles against the backdrop of these twin evils: capitalism and white supremacy, which manifests not only within the dominant industrial food system but also within our food movement and within the food sovereignty movement. We are concerned that we are all engaged in this work of divesting ourselves of internalized racial oppression. In fact, it’s not auxiliary to the work. This is the work.

Adapted from presentation at “Food Sovereignty: a critical dialogue” conference at Yale University in 2013. More info, here.

Voices from the field 3

Farm workers, a new sort of apartheid

Rosalinda Guillén, Executive director of Community to Community

I am a farm worker that now understands that we are but one small but very, very important component of a system. I am connected to the history of slavery in the agricultural industry of this country because we are the new slaves. I can say as a Mexican American, there is a new group of slaves making the agricultural industry very rich in this country.

In many of the communities where we are working in the United States, we learn how to live in a sort of apartheid system, an economic apartheid, a social apartheid, and of course a racial apartheid. We are hidden, we are silent, we work.

The average lifespan of a farm worker in the United States is still only 49 years. That is what it takes to keep up the production that is required by the agricultural industry so that you can have your berries and fresh vegetables. And some of us die before that age. Antonio Zambrano was killed by the police in Pasco, Washington for throwing a rock out of his frustration at the poverty he was living in and the disrespect and treatment he and his family have been receiving for many, many years.

To us, ag policy means that pesticides are still being used. Ag policy to us means that the piece-rate wage is the legal, institutionalized wage theft process that almost every farm worker in this country must use in order to receive a paycheck. That is why our lifespan is 49 years of age: piece-rate wage system and pesticides. Stop and listen, we are the canaries in the mine. The agricultural industry is unleashing chemicals into the fields of California that are going to be used all over the country and it will come back to you, the consumer. Listen to us, the farm workers.

We make the road by walking. We don’t know what that road will look like but we have to walk together and we have to live well as we’re making that road. That means we all have to give our commitment. The road we walk together must lead to the table where you can sit with your family and eat your food, knowing your dinner on your plate is free and clear of all exploitation of humans and of Mother Earth.

Adapted from presentation at Food First 40th Anniversary Panel in 2015.

Boxes

Newsletter no 23 - Food justice and food sovereignty in USA

Box 1

Definition of food justice

Food Justice refers to a wide spectrum of efforts that address injustices within the U.S. food system. Weak forms of food justice focus on the effects of an inequitable food system, while stronger forms of food justice focus on the structural causes of those inequities. For example, reformist projects for food justice work to provide food access in underserved communities to alleviate food insecurity and/or strive to improve food and labor conditions within the industrial food system through niche markets (e.g. organic and fair trade certification).

Progressive forms of food justice take this a step further by producing food (typically with organic, permaculture and/or agroecological methods) and working for more equitable access to food-producing resources such as land, credit and markets, and for better wages and working conditions for all farmworkers and food workers (not just those benefitting from niche markets).

Radical food justice focus on redistributive, structural transformations in the food system that build political power in underserved, exploited and oppressed communities—including people of color, immigrants, women, LGBTQ people—and works to dismantle the laws, regulations, institutions and cultural norms that entrench corporate, monopoly and white, male privilege in the food system. Radical and progressive forms of food justice overlap with food sovereignty, a concept of international origin defined as people’s right to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems.

Box 2

The U.S. Food Sovereignty Alliance: Nourishing food justice

Resistance to the legacy of structural racism in the United States is an historical pillar of what we call “Food Justice.” The struggle for food justice takes place in the thousands of underserved rural and urban communities across the country—communities that are reeling from the negative impacts of the corporate food regime. The agrofood monopolies of this regime poison our workers and our environment with toxic chemicals to produce the cheap, processed food making us sick. Over 50 million people in the U.S.—mostly food and farm workers, women, children and people of color—are food insecure and suffer from devastating diet-related diseases. In the United States small-scale, family farmers now constitute less than 2% of all the registered farmers in the country… we have more people in prison than we do on the land.

Food justice in the U.S. takes many forms to address these inequities head-on. Underserved communities are farming on vacant urban lots and roof tops, a new generation of young farmers are growing organic food for their communities, farmers markets and community supported agriculture and local food policy councils are flourishing and policy advocacy on issues such as migrant labor, environmental justice, GMO labeling and public health are becoming more powerful.

In the last decade, the food justice movement has grown rapidly in the U.S. among communities that believe that our food system should serve—not exploit and poison—people of color. Many believe that radical food justice can be a path towards liberation. Thanks to the militant work of grassroots organizations, food justice is also being embraced by socially conscious consumers who demand chemical-free food, fair wages and dignified working conditions for workers. Everyone believes our family farmers should be paid fairly for the food they produce. Many are working to turn their local food systems into engines of economic growth under the control of underserved communities. All of us seek an end to corporate control over our food. Food should be for people, not monopoly profit.

It’s no coincidence that with the rise of Food Sovereignty movement, Food Justice has also emerged as a concept, a form of resistance and as a political proposal on a global scale. The growing convergence between the two is the result of international exchanges and connections between local organizations with global social movements, especially La Via Campesina International. In part this is because on one hand, the creation of Via Campesina and the rise of food sovereignty have influenced scholars, NGOs and grassroots organizations. Also, with the advance of globalization, racism in the food system is worsening around the world.

The U.S. Food Sovereignty Alliance
The U.S. Food Sovereignty Alliance (USFSA), is a broad-based network of 33 grassroots organizations and NGOs committed to building the collective power of the Food Justice and Food Sovereignty movements. The USFSA was born when farmers groups and community, labor and food security organizations met to discuss long-term actions to highlight the root causes of the 2008 global food crisis (that had been largely brought about by U.S. companies and U.S. policies). That summer was the first meeting held by this working group in Washington, D.C. They called for a stronger policy agenda that included fair prices for farmers and consumers; equity in the food system; sustainable agriculture; workers’ rights and the Right to Food.

In 2009, the Working Group on the Global Food Crisis brought even more people to Washington D.C. working in grassroots food justice organizations. Out of that gathering, participants launched a series of two year initiatives to support a campaign to end the food crisis.

In October of 2009, a small sub-set of allies organized the First Food Sovereignty Prize in Des Moines, Iowa during the annual conference of the Community Food Security Coalition (CFSC). The Food Sovereignty Prize became an important strategy to disseminate the concept of food sovereignty in the U.S. by highlighting the work of grassroots organizations. During the CFSC conference, members of the Working Group discussed a long-term vision and strategy that was based on the creation of a broader alliance with different sectors in the U.S.

Then, the group mobilized of resources to support farmers’ leadership in national agricultural anti-trust hearings organized by the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. This was followed by holding a People’s Movement Assembly on Food Justice and Food Sovereignty at the U.S. Social Forum in Detroit, Michigan in 2010.

The need for a national alliance between migrant workers, farmers, urban families and NGOs to tackle the issues of food justice and food sovereignty became clear at this gathering. For two days grassroots organizations, farmers and NGOs from several cities in the U.S. as well as representatives of Via Campesina International from Honduras, Palestine, Haiti and the Dominican Republic met to discuss how local organizations could join a political process to radically democratize the food system, rooted in a global agenda set by social movements. Four months later, in October of 2010, the USFSA was launched at the CFSC conference in New Orleans.

Looking ahead
Since the launching of the U.S. Food Sovereignty Alliance, food sovereignty and food justice in the country faces a new set of challenges. In the name of “fiscal austerity”, the National Congress threatens to cut thousands of families from food stamps and other social programs. Seven states in the U.S. have passed “gag” laws that prohibit the documentation and dissemination of wrongdoings by agribusinesses. A growing police state has declared war on young people of color. But also, signs of a new wave of popular, mass movements for #BlackLivesMatter, Climate Justice and actions against Monsanto have emerged and are growing fast.

This October, the U.S. Food Sovereignty Alliance will hold its III General Membership Assembly and the VII Food Sovereignty Prize in Des Moines , Iowa, October 13-15th. As we reach our five-year milestone, we are committed to our mission to build the global struggle for food justice and food sovereignty by steadily building trust and nourishing the leadership of working class families and communities of color to reclaim their lives and their bodies from structural racism. By bringing together NGOs and grassroots organizations in a broad alliance with different social sectors in the U.S. and abroad, the USFSA is an important space in the defense of justice and sovereignty.

For more information on the USFSA contact Saulo Araújo and Tristan Quinn-Thibodeau, WhyHunger.

Box 3

Black lives matter

The food justice movement is a reflection of the rise in social and political resistance against structural racism. Contrary to mainstream claims of a “post-racial society,” an alarming rise of institutional violence against young African-Americans and people of color in the United States has accompanied the food, fuel and financial crises. Movements for justice and liberation like #BlackLivesMatter are making it impossible to ignore the problem of racism any longer—on the right and the left.


On August 8, progressive presidential candidate and Vermont senator Bernie Sanders appeared in Seattle to talk about social security and Medicare but was interrupted when two members of the local chapter of #BlackLivesMatter took the stage. August 9 marked the one-year anniversary of the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, at the hands of the police and the protesters were asking for four and a half minutes of silence in recognition of the four and a half hours the police kept Brown’s lifeless body on a Ferguson street. They criticized Sanders and other progressives for failing to tackle racism. Many people in the predominantly white crowd became angry with the protesters and demanded that they let the senator speak but Sanders left the stage. He later released a written statement in which he said he was “disappointed because on criminal justice reform and the need to fight racism there is no other candidate for president who will fight harder than me.”

Ever since the event took place, there has been a lot of discussion about whether or not the protest was positive for #BlackLivesMatter. Some believe it was necessary in order to hold white progressives accountable for the issue of structural racism. Others are confused as to why Sanders was targeted since he has always been a supporter of civil rights. This protest, however, was not just about Sanders: it was about all progressives failing to take on the fight against racism. While Sanders may have been disappointed by the outcome that day, this experience will ultimately be valuable to him. It showed him what is important to the people, giving him the opportunity to address those concerns and gain support. #BlackLivesMatter is forcing progressives to have the uncomfortable conversation about racism and is pressuring political figures to take action. They are making it clear to candidates and to the public that we cannot move forward politically without addressing the violence of structural racism.

Read the full news story here.

The perspective of an indigenous man who was present at the event, here.

In the spotlight

Newsletter no 23 - Food justice and food sovereignty in USA

In the spotlight 1

Racism and capitalism

Our modern food system has co-evolved with 30 years of neoliberal globalization that privatized public goods and deregulated all forms of corporate capital, worldwide. This has led to the highest levels of global inequality in history. The staggering social and environmental costs of this transition have hit people of color the hardest, reflected in the record levels of hunger and massive migrations of impoverished farmers in the global South, and the appalling levels of food insecurity, diet-related diseases, unemployment, incarceration, and violence in underserved communities of color in the global North.

The U.S. food movement has emerged in response to the failings of the global food system. Everywhere, people and organizations are working to counteract the externalities inherent to the “corporate food regime.” Understandably, they focus on one or two specific components–such as healthy food access, market niches, urban agriculture, etc.–rather than the system as a whole. But the structures that determine the context of these hopeful alternatives remain solidly under control of the rules and institutions of the corporate food regime.

Neoliberal globalization has also crippled our capacity to respond to the problems in the food system by destroying much of our public sphere. Not only have the health, education, and welfare functions of government been gutted; the social networks within our communities have been weakened, exacerbating the violence, intensifying racial tensions, and deepening cultural divides. People are challenged to confront the problems of hunger, violence, poverty, and climate change in an environment in which social and political institutions have been restructured to serve global markets rather than local communities.

Notably, the food justice movement has stepped up–supported largely by the non-profit sector – to provide services and enhance community agency in our food systems. Consciously or not, in many ways the community food movement, with its hands-on, participatory projects for a fair, sustainable, healthy food system, is rebuilding our public sphere from the ground up. This is simply because it is impossible to do one without reconstructing the other.

But as many organizations have discovered, we can’t rebuild the public sphere without addressing the issues that divide us. For many communities this means addressing racism in the food system. The food movement itself is not immune from the structural injustices that it seeks to overcome. Because of the pervasiveness of white privilege and internalized oppression in our society, racism in the food system can and does resurface within the food movement itself, even when the actors have the best of intentions. Understanding why, where, and how racism manifests itself in the food system, recognizing it within our movement and our organizations and within ourselves, is not extra work for transforming our food system; it is the work.

Understanding how capitalism functions is also the work, because changing the underlying structures of a capitalist food system is inconceivable without knowing how the system functions in the first place. And yet many people trying to change the food system have scant knowledge of its capitalist foundations.

Luckily, this is changing as activists in the food movement dig deeper to fully understand the system behind the problems they confront. Many people in the global South, especially peasants, fishers, and pastoralists, can’t afford not to under- stand the socio-economic forces destroying their livelihoods. Underserved communities of color in the global North–there as the result of recent and historical waves of colonization, dispossession, and exploitation–form the backbone of the food justice movement. Understanding why people of color are twice as likely to suffer from food insecurity and diet-related disease– even though they live in affluent northern democracies–requires an understanding of the inter- section of capitalism and racism.

Activists across the food movement are beginning to realize that the food system
cannot be changed in isolation from the larger economic system. To fully appreciate the magnitude of the challenges we face and what will be needed to bring about a new food system in harmony with people’s needs and the environment, we need to understand and confront the social, economic, and political foundations that created–and maintain–the food system we seek to change.

In the spotlight 2

Reform or transformation?

The global food crisis has pushed the U.S. food movement to a political juncture. A sixth of the world’s population is now hungry–just as a sixth of the U.S. population is “food insecure.” These severe levels of hunger and insecurity share root causes, located in the political economy of a global, corporate food regime.

Because of its political location between reformist calls for food security and radical calls for food sovereignty, food justice is pivotally placed to influence the direction of food-systems change. How issues of race and class are resolved will influence the political direction of the food justice movement’s organizational alliances: toward reform or toward transformation.

Recognizing that today’s industrial food system is unsustainable, the U.S. food movement calls for quality, environmental sustainability, and safety of food as well as for the reaffirmation of environmental values and community relationships associated with halcyon days of a reconstructed agrarian past. These make up what Alkon and Agyeman (2011a) refer to as the “dominant food-movement narrative.” Grounded in the social base of predominantly white, middle-class consumers, this narrative has become an important reference in the mainstream media. However, it also tends to render the food histories and realities of low-income people and people of color invisible.

Community Food Security (the “good food movement”) frames food-system inequities in terms of food production and acquisition rather than structural inequality, resulting in an emphasis on enhancing food skills and alternative means of food access for low-income households, coupled with a Washington D.C.-focused lobbying effort for increased forms of food aid and support for community food systems. The CFS movement strives to mainstream food security into the existing food system.

The food sovereignty movement seeks to dismantle global markets and the monopoly power of corporations at local, national, and international scales, and advocates redistributing and protecting productive assets such as seeds, water, land, and processing and distribution facilities. While anti-hunger and food-security advocates often prefer affordable access to bad food over no food at all, this puts them at odds with food-justice and food-sovereignty groups who distrust these large agrifood corporations (Gottlieb and Joshi 2010, 215).

The Food Justice movement (FJ) overlaps broadly with CFS, but tends to be more progressive than reformist in that it addresses specifically the ways in which people of color in low-incomecommunities are disproportionately and negatively impacted by the industrial food system. Caught between the urgency of access and the imperative of equity, the food-justice movement shifts, overlaps, and bridges with the efforts of the CFS and food-sovereignty movements, attempting to address racism and classism on one hand while trying to fix a broken food system on the other.

While moderate food system reforms–such as increasing food stamps or relocating grocery stores–are certainly needed to help vulnerable communities cope with crises, because they address proximate rather than the root causes of hunger and food insecurity, they will not alter the fundamental balance of power within the food system and in some cases may even reinforce existing, inequitable power relations. Fixing the dysfunctional food system–in any sustainable sense–requires regime change. Food system change will come from powerful and sustained social pressure that forces reformists to roll back neo-liberalism in the food system. Much of this pressure could come from the food movement–if it overcomes its divides.

Solving the food crisis requires dismantling racism and classism in the food system and transforming the food regime. This challenges the food-justice movement to forge alliances that advance equitable and sustainable practices on the ground while mobilizing politically for broad, redistributive structural reforms. This pivotal praxis may yet produce a new, powerful food movement narrative: the narrative of liberation.

References:
Alkon, Alison Hope, and Julian Agyeman. 2011a. Introduction: The food movement as polyculture. In Cultivating Food Justice: Race, Class, and Sustainability, 1-20. Food, Health, and Environment; series ed. Robert Gottlieb. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Gottlieb, Robert, and Anupama Joshi. 2010. Food Justice. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Newsletter no 23 – Editorial

Newsletter no 23 - Food justice and food sovereignty in USA

Food justice and food sovereignty in USA

Food Sovereignty emerged as La Via Campesina’s bold response to the “free trade” regimes destroying livelihoods around the world. It’s been taken up widely across the Global South by communities reeling from the spread of agrofuels, GMOs, land grabs and the “privatization of everything.”

One reason for food sovereignty’s popularity is because neoliberal globalization has concentrated nearly half the planet’s wealth into the hands of just 80 individuals. Food Sovereignty is the cry of the dispossessed.

Another reason is that food sovereignty reflects the deep resistance of people’s historical struggles against exploitation, oppression and colonization. When communities fighting for their rights discover the principles of food sovereignty, their reaction is often “Yes! That’s what we’re doing!” On the front lines, the common roots of resistance are quickly recognized.

Food justice is one such struggle. The radical roots of food justice in the United States are deep in the movement for Black Liberation. In the 1960s, following on historical traditions of self-care by African American communities, the Black Panthers brought food, health services, housing and education to their neighborhoods—placing them under community control. Food was one plank in a larger platform for liberation: freedom from hunger and police brutality were sovereign rights.

Today’s struggles confront hunger and violence at the intersection of race, class and gender, driving Food Justice to its radical roots of resistance—and toward food sovereignty. In this edition, we share perspectives on the powerful and mutually enriching convergence of food justice and food sovereignty.

Eric Holt-Giménez, Food First

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Voices from the field

Newsletter no 22 - Nutrition and food sovereignty

Voices from the field 1

Food and nutrition under the neoliberal model in our Chile

World March of Women-Chile (MMM-Chile)

The neoliberal model in Chile transformed the economy through a system of privatization of goods and services such as: education, health and social services. It also drastically separated the rich neighborhoods from the poor ones. If you do not want to see poverty, you will never find it because, modern urban planning created large avenues and direct access tunnels from the airport towards the big city. This way, businessmen and business women are taken straight to the upper districts. Today, this is our Chile: firmly set on extractive industries and with an income gap which puts us between the top seven countries with the highest inequality and worst wealth distribution.

Within this neoliberal model, the food and nutrition of the population gradually changed for the worse, up to the point where it replaced the balanced diet of our Chilean kitchens. The agricultural counter-reform caused an agricultural change which led to a focus on fruit crops and vineries for export. As such, it eliminated traditional crops and forced out the peasants which in turn led to their massive migration to the cities and transformed them into a cheap labor force. Two consequences arose, the first being that on our tables we no longer have the high diversity of our fruits, cereals and vegetables. A second consequence is that home cooked food is no longer consumed by the public; they have replaced it with junk food which entered the market with feast and glory alongside big corporations and transnational companies which threaten the food sovereignty of the people.

The negative impact of this model on the lives of the peasants has mostly had repercussions on women, having a direct impact on them for decades. The phenomenon known as “the feminization of poverty” increased migration, school drop-out rate and work insecurity and instability; it caused chronic health issues due to the haphazard use of insecticides on the plantations where women work (e.g. birth defects, spontaneous abortions, etc.). Currently, because of the direct effect of malnutrition on women of reproductive age, a diagnosis of gestational diabetes is often given to pregnant women.

Bad nutrition has surged considerably, up to the point where obesity level is high in the adult population, and with a rate that reaches 20% in children under six years-old. The natural relations between cities and the fields have been systematically wiped-out and the “farm-to-table” phrase, instituted decades ago, no longer exists. Sadly and usually, the population is not aware that said connection brings about a fair trade with a healthy, free from agricultural toxins and pesticides diet, which does not harm their health. Junk food is on the opposite end of the spectrum and in the long run it is the more expensive one due to its excess of carbohydrates and sugars which cause added damage and chronic illnesses like hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular conditions.

Voices from the field 2

When there are language, border and livestock, the nation of Mongolia is prosperous! (ZunduinDorj)

Munkhbolor (Bolor) Gungaa, Member of Mongolian Alliance of Nomadic Indigenous People, Mongolia.

Inadequate control over and ownership of land by nomadic herders in Mongolia has allowed foreign investors to lease significant areas of land for commercial purposes and has increased land concentration and landlordism in the country.

According to the World Bank, mining has led to rapid economic growth in Mongolia, but the reality for people living near the mines is different. Pollution has had an impact on everyone, but the people who have suffered the greatest impoverishment are the nomadic herder communities. Their life-sustaining pastures, water springs and seasonal camps are being lost to open-pit mines and the road building, waste dumping and water extraction that come along with the mining industry [Global Development Professional Network]. Mining exploitation has produced a shortage of animal grazing land and water sources, compelling pastoralists to leave their nomadic lifestyle and move to urban areas seeking for their survival. The population in the capital Ulaanbaatar has been growing rapidly as a result of the high forced exodus of many pastoralist families who had to settle down in urban areas without their free, prior and informed consent due to loss of their livelihoods in their customary lands. Migration to urban centres has impacted negatively on the nomadic Mongolians who have lost their traditional knowledge for food and nutrition security.

Mongolia in the heart of Inner Asia is known as spiritually and historically connected to the richness of nomadic culture and its horseback kitchen [“Horseback kitchen” relates to the history and way of life of Mongolian nomadic people. They move long ways on horsebacks and eat their meals while riding.]. Mongols, as descendants of Chingis Khan, whether they are policy makers or pastoralists, are all blessed and will never fall on their knees, but stand ever brighter on their shoulders! As the descendants of the great queens of wisdom, Mongolian women and their children have the historical rights to live on their customary lands and feed the world with sustainable and nutritious food from generation to generation. The continuous resource exploitation in their customary lands is affecting women in a particular way, forcing them to give up their maintaining role in food security as well as causing health problems, especially in relation to birth defects on newly born children.

Boxes

Newsletter no 22 - Nutrition and food sovereignty

Box 1

Urban agriculture and resistance in Gaza

Across the Occupied Palestinian Territories, urban agriculture and livestock keeping have always been an important component to community survival and resistance to occupation [Rami Zurayk, Anne Gough, Ahmad Sourani, and Mariam Al Jaajaa, “Food Security Challenges and Innovation: The Case of Gaza”, High Level Expert Forum: Food Insecurity in Protracted Crises, Rome: 13-14 September 2012]. In the Gaza Strip, these small, but ubiquitous rooftop gardens have become a necessity.

Traditional peasant agriculture in the Gaza Strip is practically impossible. This densely populated territory hosting a large local and refugee population consistently loses its productive land for many reasons. With a current population estimated at 1.8 million, land is often lost to the necessary expansion of human settlements and land pollution resulting from non-functioning or damaged sewage systems. Conflict and security controls have seriously damaged or restricted access to arable land. The destruction caused by operation ‘Cast Lead’ in 2009 and the expansion of a “security buffer zone” along the south-east border with Israel, rendered 46% of agricultural land in the Gaza Strip inaccessible or out of production [FAO and OCHA, “Farming without Land, Fishing without Water: Gaza’s Agricultural Sector Struggles to Survive”, May 2010]. The buffer zone contains some 30% of Gaza’s arable land and previously held many rain-fed crops and grazing lands for livestock; many producers risk their lives trying to access this land that they so desperately need. Recent Israeli offensives in 2012 and 2014 have further damaged arable lands and agricultural infrastructure, including equipment and other inputs, as have export and import sanctions by Israel [United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), Gaza Situation Report 88, 16 April 2015].


With the limitations on traditional food production, agriculture in Gaza has become more urban than rural. With the increasing need for access to safe and nutritious food, income generating activities, and improved environmental quality, rooftop gardens have become a critical and necessary solution, as well as a mode of resistance for the people of Gaza. Rooftops are some of the only open spaces left in many parts of Gaza and many families rely on these gardens for staple items keeping small animals, and growing foods such as tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers. When there are market shortages or during times of conflict it is unsafe to go to the markets or venture out into the street and many families and neighbourhoods rely on what they can access from their roofs.

The Palestinian Agricultural Relief Committee (PARC) has led the way in supporting improved urban agriculture across Gaza, through providing training courses and assisting families set up home and rooftop gardens. Recognizing the critical need for urban food production to ensure the nutritional, health and food needs, many international organizations are now also providing technical support to help Gazan families grow household and community gardens.

After each Israeli attack that Gaza has suffered, as the homes and lives are rebuilt, the gardens also continue to emerge. The green roofs that mark the crowded landscape of Gaza represent the tenacity and resilience of the community and are a real testament to the depths of the struggle for food sovereignty; what external bodies and states deny the people, they provide for themselves [For more information see: Ahmed Sourani, “The Relief and Reconstruction Plans in Gaza Strip: Between the Resilient Development Strategy and Feed to Survive Strategy”, UN Working Paper, 1 April 2015].

Box 2

Food sovereignty, the right to have food and the effects of conflicts of interest

Food sovereignty among the population is one of the rights most at risk, especially in Mexico. Political will is necessary in order to achieve food sovereignty among the population. The state has to establish the necessary mechanisms for guaranteeing this right among the people, not only by considering consumption but also by considering agricultural policies in the countryside.

Some of the factors which are creating instability for the population are: human rights violations, conflicts of interest and poor public policies which “rob” citizens of the power to decide what to consume and the quality of food to offer their families. In the last few decades the interests of the private sector have been strongly favoured over public health interests at the cost of deterioration in the health of the population.

Much has been the result of misleading advertising, a lack of adequate labelling and clear guidance which allows the population to know where basic products like maize come from. There has been a devastating abandonment of agricultural policies which favour small-scale producers with priority given instead to industrial-scale practices.
In Mexico political commitments in the countryside have been ignored, nevertheless civil society continues to resist through demands for empowerment and fulfilment of their human rights. Examples include the demands of the Alliance for Healthy Eating for a tax on fizzy drinks and the installation of drinking fountains in schools. This was successful in bringing about a tax on sugary drinks and the installation of drinking fountains in all the schools in the country. Both initiatives were big strides towards the improvement of public health, but much more still needs to be done (planning, implementation, appropriate evaluation) and all this needs to be implemented in its entirety, free of conflicts of interest.

Another big achievement in the area of public health has been the prevention of mass cultivation of transgenic maize in the country. This was achieved through a Demanda Colectiva Ciudadana (Citizens Collective Claim) to protect native maize. Other initiatives have arisen in the same way to protect lives and land such as national days for the defence of the earth, employment, water, life, and the Mexican Alliance against Fracking, to name just a few important causes [http://www.hoyquecomierontushijos.org/, http://elpoderdelconsumidor.org/, https://www.facebook.com/pages/Encuentro-Nacional-Defensa-de-la-tierra-agua-y-vida/478188112283948, http://mexicovsgmo.org/, http://alianzasalud.org.mx/, http://nofrackingmexico.org/].

It is imperative that policies are free of conflicts of interest, based on human rights (especially the right to health, to food, and to water), that they favour small producers, and as a consequence make the food available to consumers nutritious, fresh and free from agrochemicals.

Box 3

Building alternative food systems through Community Supported Agriculture

URGENCI is the global network of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) around the world. As such, we are part of the food sovereignty movement and the Nyéléni Europe process. The network is built on the principles of shared risks and benefits and solidarity between producers and consumers. It has now over 1 million members.

Our key objectives are to strengthen small-scale farmers’ role in the food chain, relocalise food chains and peasant agriculture, and ensure that solidarity and commitment towards farmers remain at the core of short supply chains.
One central aspect of CSAs, from a right to adequate food and nutrition perspective, is the participation of marginalised members of the community through a diversity of mechanisms. An interesting example is the Community Farm in Cloughjordan, Ireland’s famous Ecovillage. Here there is a sliding scale of payment, where the elderly, unemployed and students pay less than those who have jobs. And because the system is trust-based, the vegetables are just laid out for people to take what they need. This encourages people to really think about how much food they actually require, ensures equity of access, and discourages any potential waste. The very nature of CSA implies that all produce is organic – although not necessarily certified – and that the local producer to consumer chain ensures maximum freshness. These two factors are both key in terms of preserving a high nutritional value in the food, as it is chemical-free and travels from farm to fork at a record rate.

CSAs cover a wide range of produce, and the current trend is towards multi-producer CSAs. The meat is always from grass-fed, pastured animals and free-range chickens. Other produce varies from country to country and is always seasonal. In some cases in Europe there are now arrangements between CSAs in different countries: in South-West France, near Toulouse, some CSAs have a monthly direct delivery of oranges and olive oil from across the border in Spain [For a selection of case studies, see Hungry for Rights project (2015) Community Based Food System: a collection of case studies and recommendations from Cyprus, France, Italy, Lithuania, Senegal and UK-Scotland].

In China, where the next URGENCI conference will be held, there are now over 500 CSAs, with a membership of 750 000 families. The farmers here, like in many other countries, are generally young, qualified neo-rural populations, who have returned to the land to be closer to and care for their aging relatives, and to ensure their communities have access to healthy locally-grown food. By using not only the State-allocated land, but also renting additional communal lands, they are building alternative food systems to the industrial agribusiness model. The Chinese and other CSAs are providing millions of people at global level with locally grown, safe, nutritious and organically grown food, in line with the principles of agroecology. www.urgenci.net

Box 4

13 steps for good nutrition

1. All women and men have equitable access and control over productive resources, jobs and incomes.
2. Women are guaranteed equal rights to study, to work, to have full control over their bodies and lives.
3. Families and communities guarantee the conditions for a woman to exercise her right to breastfeed, as the first act of food sovereignty.
4. Small scale producers, communities and consumers define public food and nutrition policies in a participatory way.
5. Agro industrial and big food production and marketing are regulated by public interest.
6. Priority given to local diversified production, by small scale producers, in line with agroecological principles.
7. Consume preferentially locally produced fresh and diversified food, products of agro-ecology, purchased at local producer markets or similar.
8. Prepare your own food, according to traditional recipes or create new ones.
9. Use oil, fats, salt and sugar in small quantities.
10. Limit the use of process products and avoid ultra-processed foods.
11. Eat regularly, attentively, with adequate time and preferably in the company of family or friends.
12. Be critical in relation to the marketing of food.
13. Exercise regularly.

In the spotlight

Newsletter no 22 - Nutrition and food sovereignty

In the spotlight 1

The human right to adequate food and nutrition can only be fully realized within the food sovereignty framework

There is nothing more basic to every human being than the acts of breathing, eating and drinking. These are fundamental activities that guarantee the water, the nutrients and the oxygen in our bodies, which are present in the foods we eat and drink and the air we breathe. Without them, we do not grow, become weak, sick and die. The struggles of people against exploitation, discrimination, hunger and malnutrition conquered the human right to adequate food and nutrition for all, among other rights and in the context of peoples and food sovereignty.

Eating and feeding one’s family and others are actions that most deeply reflect the richness and complexity of human life in society. The ways in which we eat are derived from our very nature but also constitute products of history and the struggles and lives of our ancestors. They are a reflection of the availability of food and water in our local environment, power relations, and economic and physical abilities to access food.

Discussions about food are inseparable from those about nutrition and health in the context of women’s rights and food sovereignty. These discussions should touch upon the diversity, quantity, nutritional composition, quality and type of food production; who produces what, how and where and who makes these decisions; access to and control over productive resources and physical and economic access to food and water; preparation methods; information on diversity and the recommended nutritional balance of diets; and the definition of healthy eating habits and the risks of consuming various foods, such as ultra-processed foods, saturated fats, and genetically modified foods, among others.

Furthermore, the definition of a proper diet cannot be reduced to a nutritionally balanced basic food ration. Food and nutrition incorporate creativity, love, care, socialization, culture, and spirituality. Thus, a proper diet is one that addresses all these dimensions and contributes to building healthy human beings, aware of their rights and responsibilities as citizens of their country and the world, their environmental responsibilities and the quality of life of their descendants.

Food for humans is much more than an instinctive act of collecting and hunting that is born exclusively from hunger. It goes far beyond the mere intake of nutrients present in nature that go into our digestion and transform into body and life. Throughout its evolution, humankind has developed intricate relationships with food processes, turning these into rich rituals linking humans and nature itself, permeated with the cultural characteristics of each community and family. When eating typical dishes of our childhood and culture with friends and family, individuals are renewed in their human dignity, reaffirm their identity, and much more at other levels that reach far beyond the strengthening of their physical and mental health.

The development of all human beings depends on the support of his or her parents, family, community and society from the moment of conception. This support manifests itself in the form of food, love, warmth, care, stimulation, education and security, among others. It is impossible to separate the individual value of each of these factors. Optimal infant and young child feeding practices, such as exclusive breastfeeding until six months of age and continued breastfeeding until two years of age or beyond, together with timely introduction of adequate complementary foods, are vital and involves all of these dimensions. In this sense, it is essential to strengthen the collective responsibility, in the first place at State’s level, for ensuring adequate conditions that enable women to optimally breastfeed without imposing additional burdens on them. In such an enabling environment, women’s and children rights are protected and fulfilled and breastfeeding can be exercised as the first act of food sovereignty.

Promoting food sovereignty, with the objective of the full realization of the human right to adequate food and nutrition for all, necessarily requires the full realization of women’s human rights. The impact of structural violence against women and girls and the systematic violations of women’s human rights on the nutrition of women and children have been concealed by the hegemonic vision of food security and nutrition. Cases of malnutrition in women and children can be attributed in large part to pervasive gender discrimination in regards to access to education and information, disproportionate burden of household responsibilities, child marriage, and teenage pregnancies. As main caregivers, families and especially mothers are also the main targets of malevolent marketing of unhealthy foods, such as breastmilk substitutes and high-fat/high-sugar foods, and thus receive inadequate, confusing messages about the best way to feed their families. Finally, food security policies and programs traditionally do not effectively tackle these structural issues, and in the name of “gender equality promotion” end up further increasing the burden on women, by placing additional responsibilities on them that in reality should be collectively shared.

This holistic conceptualization of food and nutrition leads us to the understanding that hunger and the different forms of malnutrition are not “natural” processes. They are in fact the result of social and economic exclusion and exploitation, particularly of:

1. The grabbing of land and other natural resources, as well as of human knowledge and practices, labour, productive and reproductive capacity and ways of life.
2. The low and unequal wage, poor working conditions and other violations of workers’ rights.
3. The indiscriminate expansion (and public promotion)of the agribusiness production model, which reduces the diversity and quality of food and poisons soils, water, workers, farming communities, and promotes global warming.
4. The accumulation of land and wealth in the hands of a few.
5. The structural violence against women and girls, including violations of their right to education, limitations on their autonomy and control over their lives and bodies.
6. The unregulated marketing practices promoting the consumption of processed food products such as breastmilk substitutes, genetically modified products, nutraceuticals, nutritional supplements and fortified food products, as well as their increasingly broad distribution.

The struggles for the human right to food and nutrition do not solely aim to satisfy hunger and nutritional needs, but rather to nourish ourselves and each other, family, friends and even strangers, to reaffirm ourselves and leverage each other as human beings in our physical, intellectual, psychological and spiritual dimensions. It is not without reason that all family and community festivities and many spiritual rituals involve acts of preparation and communion of food. In doing so, we reaffirm our identity and cultural diversity in the context of the universality of being human and we realize our food sovereignty.

In the spotlight 2

The corporate take-over of food and nutrition policy spaces

Deregulation policies over the past decades have led to an immense concentration of corporate power in global food systems and have consolidated the influence of corporations over public policy making, both at national and international levels, stripping communities and families of their abilities to transform nature and food into nutritional well-being and health. Under the umbrella of public-private partnerships (PPPs) and multi-stakeholder initiatives, private corporations are assuming an increasingly prominent role in shaping public policies, and are thereby taking over the functions of elected governments, undermining the very core of the democratic governance. This new trend carries serious implications for food sovereignty. Indeed, policies and interventions aimed at food and nutrition are increasingly oriented in the profit-seeking interests of corporations and their shareholders, rather than the physiological and nutritional needs of the general population and more specifically the communities affected by hunger and malnutrition, which become further marginalized.

The World Economic Forum (WEF) in 2010 launched the final report of its Global Redesign Initiative (GRI) [See Readers’ Guide to the Global Redesign Initiative of the University of Massachusetts which summarizes the key proposals of the WEF. The full report here.], in which it proposes the radical restructuring of global governance towards a multi-stakeholder arrangement in which private corporations take part in negotiations and decision-making processes together with government representatives. While this may sound like wishful thinking it is unfortunately a reality, with nutrition and health issues being at the forefront of the corporate takeover of public governance spaces. According to the GRI proposal, the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) would be replaced by a “Global Food, Agriculture and Nutrition Redesign Initiative” operating under joint state and non-state supervision.

In 2008, the UN Standing Committee on Nutrition (SCN), the harmonising body for nutrition-related policies and programmes of the United Nations, was effectively shut down due to its relatively strong policy on engagement with private sector and the civil society constituency’s resistance to including the private sector as a constituency. At the same time, the same actors who had (unsuccessfully) pushed for private sector participation in the SCN, and subsequently led the way in discrediting and draining it out of funding, were promoting a new initiative of global reach — the Scaling up Nutrition Initiative (SUN). In contrast to the SCN, which is accountable to governments, SUN opens the door for strong private sector engagement in nutrition in line with the GRI vision. Its members (including of its Lead Group) include large transnational food and beverage corporations and agribusinesses [Companies participating in SUN include PepsiCo, Mars, Unilever, Syngenta and BASF, full list here], some of which have been involved in human rights abuses in the past and are known for their resistance to public health regulations.

Involvement of private corporations in food and nutrition governance through PPPs such as SUN presents a real threat to food sovereignty. It introduces a bias towards technical, artificial and product-based solutions, such as therapeutic and fortified food products, genetically-modified crops, and nutritional supplements, and diverts attention from the social determinants and human rights violations which underlie hunger and malnutrition.

Moreover, a blind eye is turned on the role of corporations that are causing hunger and malnutrition through inappropriate marketing of breastmilk substitutes and unhealthy foods, abusive labour and contracting policies, land and resources grabbing, pollution and destruction of eco-systems and biodiversity, etc., and the urgent need for binding regulations. Perhaps most importantly, this corporate take-over of food and nutrition governance spaces has negative implications for the rich and complex socio-cultural processes of eating and nourishment for individual communities and families around the world, by promoting unsustainable production methods and global warming.

In November last year, the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2) took place in Rome. In the run-up to and during the conference, social movements and civil society organisations formed a broad alliance to advocate for nutrition policies and interventions which have people — and in particular affected communities and small-scale food producers — at their centre and are based on and promote the human right to adequate food and nutrition in the broader framework of food sovereignty, indivisibility of rights and women’s and children’s rightsn [The civil society and social movement statements before and at ICN2 can be found here]. They called on States to put a coherent governance mechanism in place, charged with following-up and ensuring accountability in relation to States’ obligations and commitments on nutrition, while meaningfully engaging civil society and, in particular, groups affected by any form of malnutrition. The Committee on World Food Security (CFS) should play a key role in this, ensuring policy coherence for food security and nutrition and was requested to fully integrate nutrition in its work plan. Social movements and CSOs strongly voiced their opposition to private sector participation in food and nutrition policy making and demanded the enactment of robust conflict of interest safeguards for all forms of engagement with the private sector.

Earlier this year, there have been attempts by some actors to carve out a prominent space for SUN in the CFS as the body is examining its future role in advancing nutrition. In response to these attempts, the nutrition working group of the Civil Society Mechanism (CSM) has called for the establishment of a transparent, informed, and participatory process within the CFS to discuss its engagement in nutrition. Last month a decision was taken by the Multi Year Program of Work (MYPOW) working group that nutrition will become a major work stream of the CFS in the coming years and that an open-ended working group on nutrition will be established.

This is a critical moment for bringing nutrition more strongly into the CFS and setting up a global harmonising body which can ensure policy coherence across sectors in line with the human right to adequate food and nutrition. However, for this to happen, CFS must develop adequate safeguards to protect its policy-making space from undue corporate influence. It is thus essential that social movements and civil society organisations, through the lens of the food sovereignty framework, bring to the centre the dimension of power in the discussions about food and nutrition governance, advocate for strengthening of conflicts of interest safeguards on the CFS and remain alert and monitor closely developments within and beyond the CFS in the nutrition arena, resisting corporate capture of this vital space and the further detachment of nutrition from food, humans and nature.

Newsletter no 22 – Editorial

Newsletter no 22 - Nutrition and food sovereignty

Nutrition and food sovereignty

Illustration: Alapinta crew in Paris

This edition of the Nyéléni newsletter focuses on nutrition as a key element of the human right to adequate food and nutrition within the framework of food sovereignty. It puts the spotlight on the artificial fragmentation of food and nutrition and attempts by the private sector to capture nutrition policy spaces. Its authors describe the impact this has on people’s nutrition and the ways communities are resisting and building alternative food systems.

Human nutrition refers to the interaction between food and the human body, and the resulting health and wellbeing of individuals. The best source of nutrition continues to be breastfeeding and diversified rich traditional foods developed by cultures throughout history. Nutrition is only one of the dimensions of eating linked to human health. The best way to guarantee adequate nutrition is through the provision of diversified, safe, and balanced diets, based on local fresh produce which is agroecologically produced, and prepared according to cultural practices. Nutrition cannot be separated from food, production models, food systems or eating practices.

Malnutrition in all its forms, including obesity, is the result of poverty, hunger, deprivation and monotony of diets, with the consumption of ultra-processed products. Nutrition-specific interventions may be fundamental to reverse acute cases of and prevent malnutrition; however, nutrition supplements or similar interventions cannot replace regular access to locally-produced, healthy, and adequate diets through access and control over productive resources, adequate wages, social protection, non-discrimination, promotion of women´s rights, and food systems built within the principle of agroecology and food sovereignty.

Flavio Luiz Schiek Valente, FIAN International

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Voices from the field

Newsletter no 21 - Rights to natural resources

Voices from the field 1

Dominion farm’s land grab in Nigeria

Farmers in Nigeria’s Taraba State are being forced off lands that they have farmed for generations to make way for U.S. company Dominion Farms to establish a 30,000 ha rice plantation. The project is backed by the Nigerian government and the G8’s New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition in Africa.

The lands being given to Dominion Farms are part of a public irrigation scheme that thousands of families depend on for their food needs and livelihoods. The local people were not consulted about the deal with Dominion Farms and, although the company has already started to occupy the lands, they are still completely in the dark about any plans for compensation or resettlement. Local people oppose the Dominion Farms project. They want their lands back so that they can continue to produce food for their families and the people of Nigeria (…). Quotes from local farmers speaking during meetings with ERA and CEED at Gassol community:

“We were happy when we heard of the coming of the Dominion Farms not knowing it was for the selfish interest of some few members of the State, Federal Government and the foreigner in charge of the Dominion Farms. Our land is very rich and good. (..)But since Dominion Farms people arrived with their machine and some of their working equipment we were asked to stop our farm work and even leave our lands as the land is completely given to the Dominion Farms project. (…)” – Mallam Danladi K Jallo

“We are speaking in one voice against Dominion Farms because we are opposing their activities. We have fish ponds that we inherited from our forefathers on that land, but Dominion Farm has said that they will sand fill all of them to give them more space to plant their crops. When they commenced work on the land they came with security personnel whom Dominion Farms mandated to evict all farmers who were working on their lands.”– Alhaji Mairiga Musa

“We do not subscribe to a foreign agricultural and farming system that we do not have knowledge. They came here to farm. The only story we hear is that our land is taken away and will be given out. We were not involved at any level. For the sake of the future and our children, we are requesting governmental authorities to ask Dominion Farms to stay away from our land” – Rebecca Sule (Mama Tina)

Environmental Rights Action (ERA), Friends of the Earth Nigeria, Center for Environmental Education and Development (CEED), full article and report here.

Voices from the field 2

Taking care of our traditional territories

Ninawá Inu Pareira Nunes – indigenous leader from the HuniKui people from the state of Acre from the North (Amazonas region) of Brazil

“God” created everything that exists and gave life. On our planet Earth, many human, animal and vegetal lives exist, with a lot of specificities and diverse interrelated relationships, however, God created something common between the living beings, the Territory and the Traditions.

We “Indigenous” peoples have a lot of customs, beliefs and traditions that are directly related to the forest, air, water, land and sun, in a single cosmological, spiritual relationship that is very profound and respectful. For us, the land has a meaning of spiritual sustainability through our customs that express our identity, which is vital and essential for the physical, spiritual and cultural reproduction of our future generations.

Since immemorial times, we, “Indigenous” Peoples, exercise fundamental and strategic roles in the protection of Mother Earth, in containing deforestation, conservation of forests and biodiversity, and other wealth of our territories that sustain our and other communities, who depend on these for livelihood, independent of our financial, academic and technological conditions. All this is possible because of our ancestral knowledge.

Nowadays technology is forcing changes in our tradition in order to guarantee a perverse and destructive development model. But for my HUNI KIU People, this is a big mistake by governments. We have real evidence that it is possible to live without destructive technology, it is possible to care for the environment of each living being in relation to its specificities, creating concrete sustainabilities, and we believe that other traditional communities believe this too.
Traditional territory for us, Huni Ku, is a 100% guarantee of our lives, through food security in traditional ways – with food coming from the rivers, lakes and streams, game from the forests, potatoes and other healthy vegetables, all of which differ from the technological ways of production where 70% of the food and feed contains agrotoxins. By way of our traditional rituals, it is possible to cure without scientific/technological intervention, differently from laboratory drugs, that say they will cure illnesses, but cause problems in other parts of our bodies. We have experienced this, generation after generation.

So we need to maintain our traditional territories as the milieu of our material and spiritual relations with the land and with our mother, because they produce everything to sustain us, in harmony with the forest and animals, maintaining the environmental equilibrium, like the air that is being breathed in the whole world. It is possible to live in a better world, without destroying Nature and our traditions. An indigenous person without territory has no tradition.

Boxes

Newsletter no 21 - Rights to natural resources

Box 1

Four Laws for the Poor in Thailand

Posting a picture of four fingers from the back of a hand on social media is a sign of solidarity with the Four Laws for the Poor campaign. The campaign began in 2008 in response to the continuing concentration of land in Thailand. According to 2014 data, 62% of private land in the country is owned by just 10% of the population. The largest land holding by a single individual is 631,263 rai (101,000 hectares).While nearly 750,000 rural families possess no land at all, 70% of privately owned land is idle land .

The Four Laws for the Poor campaign seeks to address disparities in land ownership and challenges faced by marginalized peoples regarding access to land. The key goals of the campaign are to have four bills proposed by social movements made into law and implemented, in order to address the long-standing land and justice issues. The campaign is mobilizing public support through social media and public events. According to the Thai constitution, citizens have the right to submit a bill for consideration by the parliament and enacted into law if backed at least 50,000 signatures.

The four bills proposed are:

1. Progressive land tax bill — the bill will impose different tax rates on land–particularly high taxes on idle land– to encourage efficient land use and avoid land concentration. Those who own a lot of land will be induced to use or sell excess land to avoid tax burden.

2. Public land bank bill — The public land bank will enable access to land to landless individuals and peasants through rent or purchase at low rates for livelihood and habitation. Portions of funds collected through progressive taxation and other financial supports from the state will be used to operate the public land bank. The land bank will also serve as a community fund for collective ownership and management of land and natural resources.

3. Community land and natural resource management rights bill — the bill will provide legal recognition of collective rights to land and natural resources in both management and ownership. The bill will also establish legal infrastructure for communities to file class action suits against state and non-state actors, and determine the roles-responsibilities of the state to support the collective rights of communities.

4. Justice fund bill — Since the Thai state has declared that lands originally occupied and inhabited by rural people are now “forest reserves”, the number of people charged with encroaching on these lands has been increasing. This bill will establish a fund for providing financial support to individuals and communities facing such criminal charges. The fund will cover the costs of legal battles/processes such as bail, court fees, etc.

The four bills are clearly interconnected: they will address land inequality and respond to both, urgent and longer-term needs of rural peoples. The Four laws for Poor campaign is one of the biggest campaigns on land issues in Thailand, led and supported by various social movements, community based organizations and landless networks from different regions of the country.

Box 2

Reclaim the Fields network in Europe

Reclaim the Fields (RtF) is a constellation of people and collective projects willing to reassume the control over food production. We are determined to create alternatives to capitalism through cooperative, collective, autonomous, real needs oriented, small scale production, thus putting theory into practice.

An important role of the RtF network is to link the local practical action of the various groups with global political struggles. One key topic we are working on is the question of getting access to land. Currently the network spreads across Europe and there is a variety of approaches included — collective farms, land occupations, protest camps, urban farming projects, anti-GMO activism, etc. Being connected in a European network allows these local initiatives to share ideas and experiences, gain more public attention in concerted actions and directly support each other.

Currently land grabbing processes–which are occurring in Europe, just as in other parts of the world–increasingly put land under control of the interests of capital accumulation. People and projects involved in RtF are putting up resistances against these land-grabbing practices in many different places and settings, and using different strategies. One well known example is the successful occupation and defence of agricultural land and forests in Notre-Dame de Landes. The planned construction of an Airport by the company Vinci could be prevented through determined resistance of local farmers and activists. Now many young people have moved to this area they call “La ZAD”, different collectives have started to revive the abandoned farms and are now growing food there.


The annual gathering of RtF, which was this year held in January in Nottingham, United Kingdom (UK) provided a platform for the activists to engage in theoretical debates and re-organise the thematic work in different working groups. For the coming year, plans were made to organise an RtF camp in the UK at the site of a newly planned mega-prison. RtF camps offer a program of workshops and are usually a place to spread the ideas to a wider audience and to support local struggles in the region. Additionally some RtF members are planning a trip to Greece to link up with different projects. These examples show that we consider it important to build alliances with other social movements, because in the attempt to (re-)gain control over our lives agriculture is just one–although very important–aspect among many.

You can find more information about the network and involved groups at www.reclaimedfields.org or get in touch by mailing to contact@reclaimthefields.org.

Box 3

The Bukittinggi Paradigm: towards an agrarian revolution*

Agrarian and aquatic reform in the 21th Century must be struggles for justice that democratize agrarian structures and build new social, economic and political relations. They incorporate space, territory, water and biodiversity. To counter the destruction of several decades of neoliberalism, the new agrarian-aquatic reforms must be revolutionary and transformative, end land and resource concentration, and resist counter-agrarian reform. Elements of the vision include:


Food sovereignty:agrarian and aquatic reform must be founded on the principles of food sovereignty and have as its central pillar, the concept of territory. Food sovereignty demands secure access to and control over farmlands, seeds, breeds, forests, pastoral lands, migratory routes, fishing areas, water bodies, seas, coasts and eco-systems by peasants, fisher-folk, pastoralists, indigenous peoples and workers. It cannot be realized without land and resource sovereignty, and the rights of food producers to govern their territories-domains, including their customs, rules and agreements for protecting, using and sharing domains across geo-political boundaries.

Redistribution of power: expropriation and distribution of private lands that do not serve a social purpose to landless/land-poor families, the over-arching goal of redistribution is to redistribute power and alter power relations in favor of small-scale food producers, their organizations and movements. Such redistribution cannot be carried out through market mechanisms. Agrarian reform must balance the priorities of peasants, family farmers, fisher-folk, indigenous peoples, the landless, pastoralists and other rural communities, emphasizing the particular needs of women and youth.

The right to resources, territory and self-determination:agrarian and aquatic reforms must guarantee rural people secure access to and control over their lands and territories, restore pride of identity and the dignity of peasants, indigenous peoples, fisher-folk, pastoralists, workers and women. It must respect the rights of mother earth, the cosmovisions of different cultures, and local autonomy and governance with equal rights for women and men. Communities of food producers should be able to make decisions over the use, management and preservation of their lands, territories and resources, with priority to the rights of women, youth and historically marginalized groups.

Defense of land and territories: all possible measures–legal, regulatory and direct action–should be used to defend lands, water, territories, minerals and biodiversity from expropriations, capitalist enclosures, commodification and destruction. Land and territory must be defended as social/collective wealth, not simply as individual property while at the same time respecting and upholding the rights of mother earth. Land speculation must be prohibited, and state and private corporations must be prevented from acquiring large expanses of land. These include community/collective titles to prevent individual land parcels from entering the market, opposing market mechanisms in land governance, peoples’ counter-enclosures such as land occupations, and mobilizations in public spaces and fora to build popular support for our struggles.

Address poverty, unemployment, hunger and distress migration: agrarian reform must create enabling conditions for enhancing standards of living for the majorityand for reviving and rebuilding rural economies, including for example, public provision of good quality, affordable and accessible services in health, education, electricity, water and sanitation, transportation, recreation, credit, banks, markets, etc. It must reverse the distress migration of rural peoples, enable the reinsertion of peasants back on their lands and ensure futures for young people in the countryside.

Rural-urban land sovereignty: A new vision must address the reality of urban areas in relation to land, water, housing, food and essential services. The same forces of speculative capital that drive land grabbing in rural areas are behind the real estate speculation that cause mass evictions of the urban poor. A strong-rural-urban alliance to resist common enemies requires rebuilding inter-dependence between producers and consumers, and revisiting concepts of social, economic, political and environmental justice.

Models of production, distribution and consumption: should be non-exploitative, environmentally responsible and slow down climate change. Energy policy is especially important since land, forests, rivers, seas and sea-beds are being captured to feed high-energy industries and lifestyles. Production models should empower and enrich small-scale food producers, not force them into debt traps or value chains they have no control over. Production and distribution models should be based on food sovereignty and agro-ecology, and support the recovery of native seeds and breeds, water harvesting, locally generated renewable energy, revival of traditional foods and re-building local food systems.

Peace, justice and dignity: food sovereignty, agrarian reform and defense of land and territories are struggles for peace, justice, dignity and life. A new agrarian reform must mobilize forces to end state, military and corporate occupations of lands and territories, oppose war and militarization of our economic systems, and challenge the criminalization of our struggles.

The full Bukit Tinggi synthesis, including the steps to realize the “vision”, see Keeping Land Local, Chapter 9.

* The international meeting “Agrarian Reform and the Defense of Land and Territory in the 21st Century, the Challenge and Future” was organized by La Via Campesina and the Global Campaign on Agrarian Reform (GCAR) to discuss the global conjuncture and identify key elements of a common strategy for agrarian reform, food sovereignty and the defense of land and territories. Over 150 representatives from peasants, fisher folk, indigenous peoples, youth, workers, women, landless workers, human rights and research organizations participated in the meeting, which was held in Bukit Tinggi, West Sumatera, Indonesia from July 10th-13th 2012.