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[Info EN] Declaration of the International Forum for Agroecology
by La Vía Campesina 09 Mar '15

09 Mar '15

DECLARATION OF THE INTERNATIONAL FORUM FOR AGROECOLOGY (http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/sustainable-pe… [1]) NYÉLÉNI, MALI, 27 FEBRUARY 2015 We are delegates representing diverse organizations and international movements of small-scale food producers and consumers, including peasants, indigenous peoples and communities (together with hunters and gatherers), family farmers, rural workers, herders and pastoralists, fisherfolk and urban people. Together, the diverse constituencies our organizations represent produce some 70% of the food consumed by humanity. They are the primary global investors in agriculture, as well as the primary providers of jobs and livelihoods in the world. We gathered here at the Nyéléni Center in Sélingué, Mali from 24 to 27 of February, 2015, to come to a common understanding of agroecology as a key element in the construction of Food Sovereignty, and to develop joint strategies to promote Agroecology and defend it from co-optation. We are grateful to the people of Mali who have welcomed us in this beautiful land. They have taught us through their example, that the dialogue of our various forms of knowledge is based on respectful listening and on the collective construction of shared decisions. We stand in solidarity with our Malian sisters and brothers who struggle - sometimes sacrificing their lives - to defend their territories from the latest wave of land grabbing that affects so many of our countries. Agroecology means that we stand together in the circle of life, and this implies that we must also stand together in the circle of struggle against land grabbing and the criminalization of our movements. BUILDING ON THE PAST, LOOKING TO THE FUTURE Our peoples, constituencies, organizations and communities have already come very far in defining Food Sovereignty as a banner of joint struggle for justice, and as the larger framework for Agroecology. Our ancestral production systems have been developed over millennia, and during the past 30 to 40 years this has come to be called agroecology. Our agroecology includes successful practices and production, involves farmer-to-farmer and territorial processes, training schools, and we have developed sophisticated theoretical, technical and political constructions. In 2007 many of us gathered here at Nyéléni, at the Forum for Food Sovereignty, to strengthen our alliances and to expand and deepen our understanding of Food Sovereignty, through a collective construction between our diverse constituencies. Similarly, we gather here at the Agroecology Forum 2015 to enrich Agroecology through dialogue between diverse food producing peoples, as well as with consumers, urban communities, women, youth, and others. Today our movements, organized globally and regionally in the International Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty (IPC), have taken a new and historic step. Our diverse forms of smallholder food production based on agroecology generate local knowledge, promote social justice, nurture identity and culture, and strengthen the economic viability of rural areas. Smallholders defend our dignity when we choose to produce in an agroecological way. OVERCOMING MULTIPLE CRISES Agroecology is the answer to how to transform and repair our material reality in a food system and rural world that has been devastated by industrial food production and its so-called Green and Blue Revolutions. We see agroecology as a key form of resistance to an economic system that puts profit before life. The corporate model over-produces food that poisons us, destroys soil fertility, is responsible for the deforestation of rural areas, the contamination of water and the acidification of oceans and killing of fisheries. Essential natural resources have been commodified, and rising production costs are driving us off the land. Farmers' seeds are being stolen and sold back to us at exorbitant prices, bred as varieties that depend on costly, contaminating agrochemicals. The industrial food system is a key driver of the multiple crises of climate, food, environmental, public health and others. Free trade and corporate investment agreements, investor-state dispute settlement agreements, and false solutions such as carbon markets, and the growing financialization of land and food, etc., all further aggravate these crises. Agroecology within a food sovereignty framework offers us a collective path forward from these crises. AGROECOLOGY AT A CROSSROADS The industrial food system is beginning to exhaust it's productive and profit potential because of its internal contradictions - such as soil degradation, herbicide-tolerant weeds, depleted fisheries, pest- and disease-ravaged monocultural plantations - and it's increasingly obvious negative consequences of greenhouse gas emissions, and the health crisis of malnutrition, obesity, diabetes, colon disease and cancer caused by diets heavy in industrial and junk food. Popular pressure has caused many multilateral institutions, governments, universities and research centers, some NGOs, corporations and others, to finally recognize "agroecology". However, they have tried to redefine it as a narrow set of technologies, to offer some tools that appear to ease the sustainability crisis of industrial food production, while the existing structures of power remain unchallenged. This co-optation of agroecology to fine-tune the industrial food system, while paying lip service to the environmental discourse, has various names, including "climate smart agriculture", "sustainable-" or "ecological-intensification", industrial monoculture production of "organic" food, etc. For us, these are not agroecology: we reject them, and we will fight to expose and block this insidious appropriation of agroecology. The real solutions to the crises of the climate, malnutrition, etc., will not come from conforming to the industrial model. We must transform it and build our own local food systems that create new rural-urban links, based on truly agroecological food production by peasants, artisanal fishers, pastoralists, indigenous peoples, urban farmers, etc. We cannot allow agroecology to be a tool of the industrial food production model: we see it as the essential alternative to that model, and as the means of transforming how we produce and consume food into something better for humanity and our Mother Earth. OUR COMMON PILLARS AND PRINCIPLES OF AGROECOLOGY Agroecology is a way of life and the language of Nature, that we learn as her children. It is not a mere set of technologies or production practices. It cannot be implemented the same way in all territories. Rather it is based on principles that, while they may be similar across the diversity of our territories, can and are practiced in many different ways, with each sector contributing their own colors of their local reality and culture, while always respecting Mother Earth and our common, shared values. The production practices of agroecology (such as intercropping, traditional fishing and mobile pastoralism, integrating crops, trees, livestock and fish, manuring, compost, local seeds and animal breeds, etc.) are based on ecological principles like building life in the soil, recycling nutrients, the dynamic management of biodiversity and energy conservation at all scales. Agroecology drastically reduces our use of externally-purchased inputs that must be bought from industry. There is no use of agrotoxics, artificial hormones, GMOs or other dangerous new technologies in agroecology. Territories are a fundamental pillar of agroecology. Peoples and communities have the right to maintain their own spiritual and material relationships to their lands. They are entitled to secure, develop, control, and reconstruct their customary social structures and to administer their lands and territories, including fishing grounds, both politically and socially. This implies the full recognition of their laws, traditions, customs, tenure systems, and institutions, and constitutes the recognition of the self-determination and autonomy of peoples. Collective rights and access to the commons are a fundamental pillar of agroecology. We share access to territories that are the home to many different peer groups, and we have sophisticated customary systems for regulating access and avoiding conflicts that we want to preserve and to strengthen. The diverse knowledge and ways of knowing of our peoples are fundamental to agroecology. We develop our ways of knowing through dialogue among them (diálogo de saberes). Our learning processes are horizontal and peer-to-peer, based on popular education. They take place in our own training centers and territories (farmers teach farmers, fishers teach fishers, etc.), and are also intergenerational, with exchange of knowledge between youth and elders. Agroecology is developed through our own innovation, research, and crop and livestock selection and breeding. The core of our cosmovisions is the necessary equilibrium between nature, the cosmos and human beings. We recognize that as humans we are but a part of nature and the cosmos We share a spiritual connection with our lands and with the web of life. We love our lands and our peoples, and without that, we cannot defend our agroecology, fight for our rights, or feed the world. We reject the commodification of all forms of life. Families, communities, collectives, organizations and movements are the fertile soil in which agroecology flourishes. Collective self-organization and action are what make it possible to scale-up agroecology, build local food systems, and challenge corporate control of our food system. Solidarity between peoples, between rural and urban populations, is a critical ingredient. The autonomy of agroecology displaces the control of global markets and generates self-governance by communities. It means we minimize the use of purchased inputs that come from outside. It requires the re-shaping of markets so that they are based on the principles of solidarity economy and the ethics of responsible production and consumption. It promotes direct and fair short distribution chains. It implies a transparent relationship between producers and consumers, and is based on the solidarity of shared risks and benefits. Agroecology is political; it requires us to challenge and transform structures of power in society. We need to put the control of seeds, biodiversity, land and territories, waters, knowledge, culture and the commons in the hands of the peoples who feed the world. Women and their knowledge, values, vision and leadership are critical for moving forward. Migration and globalization mean that women's work is increasing, yet women have far less access to resources than men. All too often, their work is neither recognized nor valued. For agroecology to achieve its full potential, there must be equal distribution of power, tasks, decision-making and remuneration. Youth, together with women, provide one of the two principle social bases for the evolution of agroecology. Agroecology can provide a radical space for young people to contribute to the social and ecological transformation that is underway in many of our societies. Youth bear the responsibility to carry forward the collective knowledge learned from their parents, elders and ancestors into the future. They are the stewards of agroecology for future generations. Agroecology must create a territorial and social dynamic that creates opportunities for rural youth and values women's leadership. STRATEGIES _I. Promote agroecological production through policies that…_ 1. Are territorial and holistic in their approach to social, economic and natural resources issues. 2. Secure access to land and resources in order to encourage long term investment by small-scale food producers. 3. Ensure an inclusive and accountable approach to the stewardship of resources, food production, public procurement policies, urban and rural infrastructure, and urban planning. 4. Promote decentralized and truly democratized planning processes in conjunction with relevant local governments and authorities. 5. Promote appropriate health and sanitation regulations that do not discriminate against small-scale food producers and processors who practice agroecology. 6. Promote policy to integrate the health and nutrition aspects of agroecology and of traditional medicines. 7. Ensure pastoralists' access to pastures, migration routes and sources of water as well as mobile services such as health, education and veterinary services that are based on and compatible with traditional practice. 8. Ensure customary rights to the commons. Ensure seed policies that guarantee the collective rights of peasants' and indigenous peoples' to use, exchange, breed, select and sell their own seeds. 9. Attract and support young people to join agroecological food production through strengthening access to land and natural resources, ensuring fair income, knowledge exchange and transmission. 10. Support urban and peri-urban agroecological production. 11. Protect the rights of communities that practice wild capture, hunting and gathering in their traditional areas - and encourage the ecological and cultural restoration of territories to their former abundance. 12. Implement policies that ensure the rights of fishing communities. 13. Implement the Tenure Guidelines of the Committee on World Food Security and the Small-scale Fisheries Guidelines of the FAO. 14. Develop and implement policies and programs that guarantee the right to a dignified life for rural workers, including true agrarian reform, and agroecology training. _ II. Knowledge sharing_ 1. Horizontal exchanges (peasant-to-peasant, fisher-to-fisher, pastoralist-to-pastoralist, consumer-and-producer, etc.) and intergenerational exchanges between generations and across different traditions, including new ideas. Women and youth must be prioritised. 2. Peoples' control of the research agenda, objectives and methodology. 3. Systemize experience to learn from and build on historical memory. _III. Recognition of the central role of women_ 1. Fight for equal women's' rights in every sphere of agroecology, including workers' and labour rights, access to the Commons, direct access to markets, and control of income 2. Programs and projects must fully include women at all stages, from the earliest formulation through planning and application, with decision-making roles. _IV. Build local economies _ 1. Promote local markets for local products. 2. Support the development of alternative financial infrastructure, institutions and mechanisms to support both producers and consumers. 3. Reshape food markets through new relationships of solidarity between producers and consumers. 4. Develop links with the experience of solidarity economy and participatory guarantee systems, when appropriate. _V. Further develop and disseminate our vision of agroecology_ 1. Develop a communications plan for our vision of agroecology 2. Promote the health care and nutritional aspects of agroecology 3. Promote the territorial approach of agroecology 4. Promote practices that allows youth to carry forward the permanent regeneration of our agroecological vision 5. Promote agroecology as a key tool to reduce food waste and loss across the food system _VI. Build alliances _ 1. Consolidate and strengthen existing alliances such as with the International Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty (IPC) 2. Expand our alliance to other social movements and public research organizations and institutions VII. Protect biodiversity and genetic resources 1. Protect, respect and ensure the stewardship of biodiversity 2. Take back control of seeds and reproductive material and implement producers' rights to use, sell and exchange their own seeds and animal breeds 3. Ensure that fishing communities play the most central role in controlling marine and inland waterways _VIII. Cool the planet and adapt to climate change_ 1. Ensure international institutions and governments recognize agroecology as defined in this document as a primary solution for tackling and adapting to climate change, and not "climate smart agriculture" or other false versions of agroecology 2. Identify, document and share good experiences of local initiatives on agroecology that address climate change. _IX. Denounce and fight corporate and institutional capture of agroecology_ 1. Fight corporate and institutional attempts to grab agroecology as a means to promote GMOs and other false solutions and dangerous new technologies. 2. Expose the corporate vested interests behind technical fixes such as climate-smart agriculture, sustainable intensification and "fine-tuning" of industrial aquaculture. 3. Fight the commodification and financialization of the ecological benefits of agroecology. We have built agroecology through many initiatives and struggles. We have the legitimacy to lead it into the future. Policy makers cannot move forward on agroecology without us. They must respect and support our agroecological processes rather than continuing to support the forces that destroy us. We call on our fellow peoples to join us in the collective task of collectively constructing agroecology as part of our popular struggles to build a better world, a world based on mutual respect, social justice, equity, solidarity and harmony with our Mother Earth. The International Forum on Agroecology was organized at the Nyeleni Center in Mali, from 24 to 27 February 2015 by the following organisations: Coordination Nationale des Organisations Paysannes du Mali (CNOP) as chair; La Via Campesina (LVC), More and Better (MaB), Movimiento Agroecológico de América Latina y el Caribe (MAELA) , Réseau des organisations paysannes et de producteurs de l'Afrique de l'Ouest (ROPPA) , World Forum of Fish Harvesters and Fishworkers (WFF), World Forum of Fisher Peoples (WFFP), World Alliance of Mobile Indigenous Peoples (WAMIP). Links: ------ [1] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/sustainable-pe…

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[Info EN] March 8th: Women’s Struggle for Food Sovereignty; against violence and agribusiness
by La Vía Campesina 04 Mar '15

04 Mar '15

WOMEN WOMEN’S STRUGGLE: FOR FOOD SOVEREIGNTY; AGAINST VIOLENCE AND AGRIBUSINESS [1] Published on Thursday, 05 March 2015 00:12 (Harare, March 8th, 2015) Today, March 8th, International Women's Day, the Via Campesina calls for the coordination of actions to highlight the fundamental role played by women in guaranteeing Food Sovereignty - not only as a means of confronting the food crisis but as an essential ethical principle that has as its basis social justice and equality. On this day of struggle, we denounce the prevailing violence, against women specifically, because the agribusiness model and capitalist interests in the countryside have exacerbated social and gender inequalities. It is in this way that we struggle against patriarchy, which affects all aspects of our lives within our families, our organisations and communities and all that has to do with our gender and our sexuality. We also express our condemnation of feminicide, the murder of millions of girl children and women in all parts of the world, and we stand in solidarity with all the people who suffer discrimination and violence because of their gender and/or sexual identity. The role of women in the Via Campesina is part of what makes this movement unique, both in the history of peasant and farmer movements and among other social movements and international organisations. For Nettie Wiebe of the Via Campesina North America, "the work, the perspectives, the energy, the leadership, and the presence of women in the Via Campesina have transformed and strengthened our movement." Not only does the model of peasant and small-scale agriculture espoused by the Via Campesina International include women, but it also insists upon their rights and allows them to be fully equal as women peasants and small-scale farmers. In the present context, land-grabbing, dispossession, and exploitation by transnationals are increasing with the expansionist model of agribusiness, and there is a corresponding increase in the vulnerability of women peasant and indigenous women who every day face expulsion from their land. In the light of the foregoing, the Via Campesina affirms the necessity of an International Convention on the Rights of Women and Men Peasants. The existing international mechanisms and conventions have proved to be limited, both with regard to the protection of the rights of peasants and small-scale farmers and to the consequences of neo-liberal policies. On this International Day of March 8th, we, women and men of the Via Campesina are defending comprehensive land reform and the natural goods - land, water, and territory - that together guarantee food sovereignty through agroecological production and a renewed awareness of the value of peasant and small-scale agriculture. For this reason, we strongly decry the destruction and depredation resulting from monoculture and the indiscriminate use of toxic chemical inputs and from the harmful effects of the activities of the transnationals in our territories. Greater profitability and productivity in the countryside means a decline in decent living conditions for millions of women and men peasants and small-scale farmers. The market cannot continue to dictate agricultural policies and to damage the health of people and of nature. On this March 8th, 2015, we will continue to globalize our struggle and to globalize hope for a fairer and more egalitarian world for all women and men. We stand in solidarity with the Peruvian indigenous peasant woman Máxima Acuña in her struggle of resistance to a transnational mining company. Her strength and her dignity are a source of inspiration, enabling us to say: We want an end to the capitalist patriarchal system. See more on the following links: * WOMEN'S MANIFESTO [2] * Video: Women planting struggles and hope [3] * Post cards to End violence against Women [4] Links: ------ [1] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/women-mainmenu… [2] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/our-conferences-mainmenu-28/6-jakarta-… [3] http://tv.viacampesina.org/Women-planting-struggles-and-hope?lang=en [4] http://tv.viacampesina.org/Post-cards-to-End-violence-againts?lang=en

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[Info EN] La Via Campesina - Newsletter February 2015
by La Vía Campesina 02 Mar '15

02 Mar '15

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[Info EN] Mali: "Agroecology is in our hands! We are building it further together!" - Opening of the International Agroecology Forum
by La Vía Campesina 24 Feb '15

24 Feb '15

MALI: ‘’AGROECOLOGY IS IN OUR HANDS! WE ARE BUILDING IT FURTHER TOGETHER!” - OPENING OF THE INTERNATIONAL AGROECOLOGY FORUM [1] Published on Wednesday, 25 February 2015 06:24 [2]Sélingué, 24 February 2015 - Today, the sun has risen brighter then ever in Mali to warm the more than 250 delegates of the first International Forum on Agroecology hosted by Confederation of Peasants Organizations [3]of Mali (CNOP) and La Via Campesina [4], at the Nyéléni Center in Sélingué, south Mali. They are women and men, from diverse constituencies, among them farmers, fisherfolks, indigenous people, pastoralists and urban _consumers_ from all corners of the world, arrived to the center in buses from Bamako and other regions of Mali. "I decided to come here because we are building a necessary movement, that will claim back what was always ours: our peasant knowledge of doing agriculture ", said a woman farmer from Mali, as she was running to attend the women caucus, this afternoon. Over the next four days, the women and men of the conference will debate, share experiences and celebrate agroecology with the view to reinforcing a common vision and principles, as well as deciding on a common strategy to claim back the concept of agroecology, "beyond just the scientific aspect, to encompass its social, economic and political elements", as Gilberto Schneider, from the Movimento dos Pequenos Agricultores [3] (MPA) in Brazil, pointed out. The Forum opened with a warm welcome to the participants by Ibrahima Coulibaly, the president of the CNOP, who explained the reason why such a forum was taking place now. According to Coulibaly, in spite of agroecology now being mentioned everywhere, it is necessary to question who really are at the center of agroecology. "We are talking about small scale food producers, peasants, fisherfolk, pastoralists, we are who feed the world population. It is we who are the real heroes of the agroecology. It is we that should have a voice", he said. Maria Noel, from Movimiento Agroecológico de America Latina y el Caribe [5] (MAELA) in Uruguay, said that agroecology has been practiced for centuries and it represents more than just a system of production. She explained that it was a way of being, a way of life, which respects the environment and provides a livelihood and income to the majority of food producers and fisherfolk on the planet. "We have to make sure that this concept is not captured by corporates", she said. In fact, the industrial agriculture system based on heavy use of harsh chemicals, which destroys both soils and forests, depletes resources, and affects the health and wellbeing of both small holders and consumers, is being systematically favoured by governments, which serve the interests of multinationals and enact free trade policies dictated by international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF. As Ibrahima Coulibaly stated: ''Humanity went too far, when we thought that we should put the economy before all. This has weakened the world, made it more vulnerable and resulted in climatic change: extreme weather, droughts, and severe water shortages", he said. Participants of the first Agroecology forum have a common understanding that the only way to save the planet for future generations is to practice a virtuous agriculture. Thus, people must stand together as one, and this is possible because "we are the majority. If we say no to industrial agriculture, it will be no!", stressed Coulibaly. Andrea Ferrante from the Italian Association of Biological Farmers [6] (AIAB) and La Via Campesina reiterated: "we are the answer. The answer to feed the world lies with agroecology. We want a model that is based on our knowledge, our way of living, not on petrol and fake answers from the industrial world. We look at the future of our children". The link between rural and urban actors has also being highlighted through a need to connect responsible consumption and production, in strong local and regional food systems based on agroecology. It is not possible to have food sovereignty, the respect of peoples right to culturally appropriate and healthy food, without agroecology,'' said Ferrante. _By Communication team of the International Forum On Agroecology_ See also: Mali: La Via Campesina and allies host an International Agroecology Forum to address Food Sovereignty [7] TO INTERVIEW REPRESENTATIVES OF THE DIVERSE CONSTITUENCIES AT THE FORUM PLEASE CONTAC Boaventura Monjane: +223 92 71 90 14 (Local mobile phone) or boa.monjane(a)gmail.com | boa.monjane(a)viacampesina.org Links: ------ [1] http://www.viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/sustainabl… [2] http://www.viacampesina.org/en/images/mali-agroecology.jpg [3] http://www.mpabrasil.org.br/ [4] http://viacampesina.org [5] http://maela-agroecologia.org/ [6] http://www.aiab.it/ [7] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/sustainable-pe…

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[Info EN] Fwd: Re: Mali: La Via Campesina and allies host an International Agroecology Forum to address Food Sovereignty
by La Vía Campesina 22 Feb '15

22 Feb '15

FYI -------- Original Message -------- SUBJECT: Re: [Info EN] Mali: La Via Campesina and allies host an International Agroecology Forum to address Food Sovereignty DATE: 2015-02-19 19:52 FROM: Cieas Organization <cieas2009(a)yahoo.com> TO: "viacampesina(a)viacampesina.org" <viacampesina(a)viacampesina.org> Dear Viacampesina I hope This Will Find you Well Thank You for the infomation of Bamako It was a very interesting Especial this focus to famers We have interest to participate To mali plaese can we participate All thore we Request Resoucies to suport us Thank you very much we look Foward To Hear from you With ReGards Solomon B Hlophe Esaff Swaziland/ Cieas Sent from Yahoo Mail on Android [1] ------------------------- FROM: La Vía Campesina <via-info-en(a)viacampesina.org>; TO: via info en <via-info-en(a)viacampesina.org>; SUBJECT: [Info EN] Mali: La Via Campesina and allies host an International Agroecology Forum to address Food Sovereignty SENT: Thu, Feb 19, 2015 4:09:35 PM MALI: LA VIA CAMPESINA AND ALLIES HOST AN INTERNATIONAL AGROECOLOGY FORUM TO ADDRESS FOOD SOVEREIGNTY [2] Published on Thursday, 19 February 2015 22:18 MEDIA ADVISORY |LA VIA CAMPESINA [3](Bamako, 19 February 2015) - More than 200 delegates, among them peasants, family farmers, fisher folk, pastoralists, indigenous peoples, agricultural workers, consumers, urban poor organizations, NGOs, academics and other social movements will be at the Nyéléni Centre in Mali from 24 to 27 February, to take part in the first International Forum on Agroecology. This forum takes places at a time where the world is facing economic crisis, the climate is changing, and the Mother Earth is being aggressively exploited by the corporate model of death and land grabbing. According to La Via Campesina [4], agroecology is essential to humanity, since it builds autonomy and a better life for small scale food producers, produces more healthy food, provides a strong base for food sovereignty, and allows rural peoples to live in harmony with and take care of our Mother Earth. Peasant and small scale food producers' agroecology is considered to be the model of life, of farms with farmers, of food producers with productive resources, of rural communities with families, of countryside with trees and forests. According to Ibrahim Coulibaly, a leader of the National Coordination of Peasants Organizations [5] (CNOP) in Mali, "this forum will bring practical responses, that will lead to concrete solutions on how agroecology can save the planet from hunger and climate change". Together with La Via Campesina, organizations such as More and Better (MaB), Movimiento Agroecológico de América Latina y el Caribe (MAELA), Réseau des organisations paysannes et de producteurs de l'Afrique de l'Ouest (ROPPA), World Forum of Fish Harvesters and Fishworkers (WFF), World Forum of Fisher Peoples (WFFP) and World Alliance of Mobile Indigenous Peoples (WAMIP) are co-organizers of the forum. The Mali forum aims at exchanging local knowledge and know-how of farmers, sharing the innovations of peasants and small scale food producers, training materials and territorial processes to address the challenges of building an ecologically and socially just  food system, as well as strengthening the synergies between the different small scale food producer organizations, social movements and other organizations promoting Agroecology. CONTACTS FOR MEDIA Boaventura Monjane - boa.monjane(a)viacampesina.org Lamine Coulibaly laminezie(a)gmail.com - mob +22376170979 Links: ------ [1] http://overview.mail.yahoo.com/mobile/?.src=Android [2] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/sustainable-pe… [3] http://viacampesina.org/en/images/stories/nyeleni/nyeleni.jpg [4] http://viacampesina.org/en/ [5] http://www.cnop-mali.org

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[Info EN] Mali: La Via Campesina and allies host an International Agroecology Forum to address Food Sovereignty
by La Vía Campesina 19 Feb '15

19 Feb '15

MALI: LA VIA CAMPESINA AND ALLIES HOST AN INTERNATIONAL AGROECOLOGY FORUM TO ADDRESS FOOD SOVEREIGNTY [1] Published on Thursday, 19 February 2015 22:18 MEDIA ADVISORY |LA VIA CAMPESINA [2](Bamako, 19 February 2015) - More than 200 delegates, among them peasants, family farmers, fisher folk, pastoralists, indigenous peoples, agricultural workers, consumers, urban poor organizations, NGOs, academics and other social movements will be at the Nyéléni Centre in Mali from 24 to 27 February, to take part in the first International Forum on Agroecology. This forum takes places at a time where the world is facing economic crisis, the climate is changing, and the Mother Earth is being aggressively exploited by the corporate model of death and land grabbing. According to La Via Campesina [3], agroecology is essential to humanity, since it builds autonomy and a better life for small scale food producers, produces more healthy food, provides a strong base for food sovereignty, and allows rural peoples to live in harmony with and take care of our Mother Earth. Peasant and small scale food producers' agroecology is considered to be the model of life, of farms with farmers, of food producers with productive resources, of rural communities with families, of countryside with trees and forests. According to Ibrahim Coulibaly, a leader of the National Coordination of Peasants Organizations [4] (CNOP) in Mali, "this forum will bring practical responses, that will lead to concrete solutions on how agroecology can save the planet from hunger and climate change". Together with La Via Campesina, organizations such as More and Better (MaB), Movimiento Agroecológico de América Latina y el Caribe (MAELA), Réseau des organisations paysannes et de producteurs de l'Afrique de l'Ouest (ROPPA), World Forum of Fish Harvesters and Fishworkers (WFF), World Forum of Fisher Peoples (WFFP) and World Alliance of Mobile Indigenous Peoples (WAMIP) are co-organizers of the forum. The Mali forum aims at exchanging local knowledge and know-how of farmers, sharing the innovations of peasants and small scale food producers, training materials and territorial processes to address the challenges of building an ecologically and socially just  food system, as well as strengthening the synergies between the different small scale food producer organizations, social movements and other organizations promoting Agroecology. CONTACTS FOR MEDIA Boaventura Monjane - boa.monjane(a)viacampesina.org Lamine Coulibaly laminezie(a)gmail.com - mob +22376170979 Links: ------ [1] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/sustainable-pe… [2] http://viacampesina.org/en/images/stories/nyeleni/nyeleni.jpg [3] http://viacampesina.org/en/ [4] http://www.cnop-mali.org

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[Info EN] La Via Campesina - Newsletter January 2015
by La Vía Campesina 21 Jan '15

21 Jan '15

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[Info EN] La Via campesina deamds the release of Huber Ballesteros
by La Vía Campesina 23 Dec '14

23 Dec '14

LA VIA CAMPESINA DEAMDS THE RELEASE OF HUBER BALLESTEROS [1] Huber Ballesteros is one of the best known trade unionists and human rights activists in Colombia. He is also one of those who have been the most threatened. He was arrested on August 25th, 2013, and accused of "rebellion" and of "financing terrorism. He has not yet been brought to trial. Huber is the vice-president of FENSUAGRO, one of the largest unions in Colombia and one of the most persecuted. In recent years, more than 1000 members of FENSUAGRO have been assassinated. We believe that Huber has been targetted because of his activism, and we are demanding his unconditional release from detention, as well as the release of all of the other political prisoners in Colombia. Please take a moment to send a message of protest to the Colombian government. http://www.labourstartcampaigns.net/show_campaign.cgi?c=2606 [2] Links: ------ [1] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/human-rights-m… [2] http://www.labourstartcampaigns.net/show_campaign.cgi?c=2606

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[Info EN] Femicide and Impunity: A humanitarian crisis in Central America, and a growing problem worldwide
by La Vía Campesina 15 Dec '14

15 Dec '14

FEMICIDE AND IMPUNITY: A HUMANITARIAN CRISIS IN CENTRAL AMERICA, AND A GROWING PROBLEM WORLDWIDE [1] [2]El Salvador has had the highest rate of femicide in the world, with 2, 250 femicides between 2010 and 2013. Guatemala has the third and Honduras the seventh highest rate of femicides. In Guatemala, only 2% of murdered women's cases were investigated in 2013 and likewise in Honduras less than 2% were investigated. For cases that somehow make it to court in Guatemala, 90% of defendants are not convicted. It is much the same in El Salvador. In 2014 alone, between January and October, over 300 bodies of young women between the ages of 12 and 18 years old have been found in unmarked common graves. Femicide is the violent and deliberate murder of a woman, and is a crime, but many national governments do not specifically define such murders as a crime in their criminal codes. Thus, femicide is difficult to prosecute through the justice system of many states. Stories of thousands of women and girls who have been murdered and then discarded like rubbish in alleyways, city streets and dumpsters continue to make headlines. The victims of femicide often show signs of torture, rape, or breast and genital mutilation and dismembered body parts. The acute epidemic of femicide in El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala is related to historical patterns of violence and abuse in Central America, where death squads and civil wars have left a legacy of violence, intimidation and ongoing impunity. But it is also linked to the prevailing history of patriarchal norms that have existed for centuries in almost all of our societies across the globe that presume that women are the property of men to be treated and disposed of according to the whims of men. In Latin America these patriarchal norms are often described as machismo. It is difficult to effectively implement proposals or laws aiming to eliminate violence, exploitation, and abuse of girls, adolescents, and women. In El Salvador a law on femicide came into effect in 2012. The law was the result of years of women's struggles and mobilizations that led to a landmark legislation to address gender-based violence enacted by former president Mauricio Funes. El Salvador's law on femicide, which carries a prison sentence of 20 to 50 years, requires judges to establish proof that the death of a woman is motivated by hatred or contempt based on gender. But there are many judges who don't take femicide seriously and don't want to deal with this crime and apply the law correctly. Public awareness campaigns that show the incremental scale of verbal, emotional and physical violence women face before femicide occurs are necessary. In addition, actions to demand respect for the human rights of women and an end to impunity are necessary. La Via Campesina's Global Campaign to End All Forms of Violence Against Women is aimed at increasing public awareness of the roots causes of, and all the types of expressions of, violence against women, and to demand an end to impunity. We urge all of our member organizations to take action and write petitions, send letters, organize protests to pressure the departments of justice of the governments of our countries to end impunity to put the murderers in jail and to do justice for these thousands of women and thus for all women. NO MORE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN! ¡NOT ONE MORE DEATH! WE STRUGGLE AGAINST IMPUNITY AND FOR THE LIVES OF WOMEN! Links: ------ [1] http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/women-mainmenu… [2] http://viacampesina.org/en/images/stories/women/photo8scaled.jpg

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[Info EN] Newsletter #2 : Social Movements' Communication Convergence at the Peoples' Summit in Lima
by La Vía Campesina 10 Dec '14

10 Dec '14

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