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PANUPS: Via Campesina Meeting
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P A N U P S
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Pesticide Action Network
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International Meeting of Small Farmers
June 14, 1996
In April 1996, one hundred members of rural and farm
organizations from 37 countries gathered in Tlaxcala, central
Mexico, to discuss ways to develop solidarity and unity among
rural organizations. Via Campesina, as the coalition is
called, promotes socially-just economic relationships, the
defense of land, food sovereignty, and equitable and
ecologically sustainable agricultural production.
Via Campesina (literally translated "Peasant Road")
coordinates organizations made up of peasants, small and
medium scale producers, agricultural workers and indigenous
communities from around the world. The conference, which
meets once every three years, is the top decision making body
of the organization.
At the meeting, people from all areas of the world reported
on social, political and economic situations in their
regions. The reports indicated that farmers everywhere are
becoming marginalized as they lose access to credit and
markets and lose their land -- primarily as the result of
actions by transnational corporations. Meanwhile,
privatization eliminates government programs designed to help
farmers with limited resources, while trade agreements place
farmers in competition with each other to produce commodities
at the lowest cost, but often at great cost to the
environment.
Position papers developed by conference participants will
provide a structure for Via Campesina's work over the next
three years. In general, Via Campesina advocates that
producers should have a voice in policies related to land use
and to the production of food, and that the process by which
such policies are determined should be democratized.
Conference participants stated that when agribusiness
determines policy, it ignores the socio-economic and
political impacts on producers and rural people. Nettle
Welbe, president of the National Farmers Union Canada, urged
people to "look past terms such as rich/poor,
developed/developing, north/south and to see the battle for
what it is -- farmers against global agro-industrial
interests."
The Tlaxcala Declaration, released at the conference, states
the problem from the perspective of the small farmers and
peasants in Via Campesina. "The prevailing neo-liberal
economic system has been the main cause for the increasing
impoverishment of farmers and rural peoples in general. It is
responsible for the increasing degradation of nature, land,
water, plants, animals and natural resources, having put all
these vital resources under centralized systems of
production, procurement and distribution of agricultural
products within the frame of a global market-oriented system.
"This economic system treats both nature and people as a
means to an end, with the sole aim of generating profits. The
concentration of this wealth in the hands of a small minority
has created dramatic constraints on farmers throughout the
world, pushing them to the brink of irredeemable extinction.
. . . We are determined to create a rural economy which is
based on respect for ourselves and the earth, on food
sovereignty and on fair trade."
The declaration expressed a commitment to rural development
that recognizes the contribution of women, and demanded that
agrarian reform return territories to indigenous peoples and
give landless farmers ownership and control of the land they
work.
Source/contact: Denise O'Brien, Women, Food and Agriculture,
RR#2, Box 79, Atlantic, Iowa 50022.
National Farmers Union, Canada, 250C 2nd Ave. S, Saskatoon,
Saskatchewan, S7K2M1 Canada; phone (306) 652-9465; fax (306)
664-6228.
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