Madame la Presidente,
I am Henry Saragih, general coordinator of La Via Campesina. I am coming here on behalf of La Via Campesina and the CETIM to congratulate you for the work of the Advisory Committee on establishing the groundwork for the promotion and the protection of the rights of peasants. As it is mentioned in the official report of the Advisory Committee, peasants rights are fundamental for our world. La Via Campesina is a global movement with organisations based in many countries. We have about 200 millions members active in our movement.

The food crisis shows that the world need to act to respond to that challenge. The victims of the food crisis are not only deprived from food, many of them are also dying. Many fall into hunger, acute poverty, and are subject to various kinds of discriminations. The economic system and profit-making in the food production chain are clearly in the picture of the food crisis. Today, in many parts of the world, the food crisis is far from over. We still see that profit-making in the sector of food production has been justified by many arguments including those used by transnational corporations. While the rhetoric of transnational corporations seems convincing (when they say that they can feed the world), the stark food shortages and speculation only confirms the fears that their solutions are misleading.

Records show that more than 1 billion people are undernourished worldwide. According to FAO, the Asia and Pacific region has the largest number of hungry people (642 million), followed by sub-Saharan Africa (264 million).

Hunger is mainly rural: peasants, small landholders, landless workers, fisher folk, hunters and gatherers suffer disproportionately. The United Nations Millennium Development Project Task Force on Hunger has shown that 80 percent of the world’s hungry live in rural areas. Some 50 per cent of the world’s hungry are smallholder farmers who depend mainly or partly on agriculture for their livelihoods, but lack sufficient access to productive resources. Therefore, the food crisis only reaffirms the urgent need for the recognition of the fundamental rights of peasants. The ability of the world to create food sovereignty is very much linked to the peasant’s way of life and mode of production. Various reports of intergovernmental organisations, independent experts and researchers, development cooperation organisations and state-commissioned reports show the importance of peasants in solving the food crisis. La Via Campesina has also documented many cases showing how the food crisis happened and how peasants’ organisations are vital in responding to it. The Advisory Committee recognise this in its latest report.

By the struggle, peasants’ organisations are now earning the long-sought recognition of their rights. La Via Campesina has started to promote peasant’s rights in 2002 and has adopted the Declaration of the rights of peasants at the International Conference of Peasants Rights in June 2008, in Jakarta, Indonesia and at the Via Campesina International Conference in October 2008 in Maputo, Mozambique. As peasants, with our allies, we can promote our own rights. La Via Campesina engaged in many consultations with members organisations, governments, experts and researchers, and other sector of the society. Those have intensified after the international conference in Jakarta 2008. We went to many parts of the world to support this effort, including to Bolivia, Brazil, Mozambique, Thailand, India, Belgium, Spain, Indonesia and Italy. We also joined some sessions of the UN bodies, including the joint initiative of the office of the President of the UN General Assembly on “the Global Food Crisis and Right to Food” in April 2009. Today, we are convinced that the right of peasants is supported and fought for by many sectors of society and policy makers.

The challenge relies on how to reach the best cooperation among various international policy making bodies. It is important that the international community recognises the role of peasants at the policy level too. We believe that working with various institutions and at various levels will generate wider opportunities to implement good practices. Heavily leaning on one policy-making structure is not helpful for all of us. In this context, I see that the world need more cooperation between institutions, and a broader recognition of the marginalisation of pedant’s lives. With this report, the Advisory Committee clearly shows the way to respond positively to the food crisis.

The report of the Advisory Committee values the importance of the peasant’s rights recognition by the UN process. With this, the UN begins to unravel the discriminations against peasants. I warmly thank the Advisory Committee for having the Peasant’s rights declaration included in the present report. It is very important. This is a landmark in the road towards the full recognition of the peasants’ struggle.

I also strongly urges the Advisory Committee to hold various and wider consultations, studies, and engagements going in the same direction as this report. We believe that by doing so, the Advisory Committee brings real support to peasants, women and men. We hope that the present deliberations will bring a stronger support to the process already going on in the UN human rights mechanism. This will represent a crucial effort to really end hunger and poverty.

I thank you.

Geneva, 27^th January 2010

Tonight is a very special night for us to get together here for the opening of the assembly of the social movements and civil society at the Klimaforum. We, the international peasant movement La Via Campesina, are coming to Copenhagen from all five corners of the world, leaving our farmland, our animals, our forest, and also our families in the hamlets and villages to join you all.

Why is it so important for us to come this far? There are a number of reasons for that. Firstly, we would like to tell you that climate change is already seriously impacting us. It brings floods, droughts and the outbreak of pests that are all causing harvest failures. I must point out that these harvest failures are something that the farmers did not create. Instead, it is the polluters who caused the emissions who destroy the natural cycles. So, we small scale farmers came here to say that we will not pay for their mistakes. And we are asking the emitters to face up to their responsibilities.

Secondly, I would like to share with you some facts about who the emitters of green house gases in agriculture really are: new data that has come out clearly shows that industrial agriculture and the globalized food system are responsible of between 44 and 57% of total global greenhouse gas emissions. This figure can be broken down as follows (i) Agricultural activities are responsible for 11 to 15%, (ii) Land clearing and deforestation cause an additional 15 to 18%, (iii) Food processing, packing and transportation cause 15 to 20%, and (iv) Decomposition of organic waste causes another 3 to 4%. It means that our current food system is a major polluter.

The question we have to answer now is: how do we solve the climate chaos, hunger and assure a better livelihood for farmers, when the agricultural sector itself is contributing more than half of the total emissions? We believe that it is the industrial and agribusiness model of agriculture that is at the root of the problem, because those percentages that I mentioned earlier come from the deforestation and the conversion of natural forests into monoculture plantations, all of which is being carried out by Agribusiness Corporations. Not by familly farmers. Such large emissions of methane by agriculture are also due to the use of urea as a petrochemical fertilizer through the green revolution, very much supported by the World Bank. At the same time, agricultural trade liberalization promoted by free trade agreements (FTA) and by the World Trade Organization (WTO) is contributing to the greenhouse gases emissions due to food processing and food transportation around the world.

If we genuinely want to tackle the climate change crisis, the only way we have to go forward is to stop industrial agriculture. Agribusiness has not only highly contributed to the climate crisis, it has also massacred the small farmers of the world. Millions of farmers , men and women from around the world, have been kicked off their land. Millions of others suffer violence every year because of land conflicts in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Small farmers and landless farmers make up the majority of the more than 1 billion hungry people in the world. And because of free trade, many small farmers commit suicide in South Asia. So putting an end to industrial agriculture is the only way we can go.

Will the current climate negotiations, that are relying on carbon trade mechanisms, bring solutions to climate change? To this we say that carbon trade mechanisms will only serve polluting countries and companies, and bring disaster to small farmers and indigenous peoples in developing countries. The REDD initiative (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) has already kicked off their land many indigenous peoples and small farmers in developing countries. And more and more agricultural land is being converted into tree plantations in order to attract carbon credits.

At COP 13 in Bali 2007, La Via Campesina proposed the landless farmers’ and small farmers’ solution to climate change, which is: “small scale sustainable farmers are cooling down the earth”. And here, at COP 15, again we bring that proposal, backing it with the figures that prove that it could reduce more than half of the global greenhouse gas emissions. This figure comes from: (I) Recuperating organic matter in the soil would reduce emissions by 20 to 35%. (ii) Reversing the concentration of meat production in factory farms and reintegrating joint animal and crop production would reduce them by 5 to 9% (iii) Putting local markets and fresh food back at the center of the food system would reduce a further 10 to 12%. (iv) Halting land clearing and deforestation would stop 15 to 18% of emissions. In short, by taking agriculture away from the big agribusiness corporations and putting it back into the hands of small farmers, we can reduce half of the global emissions of greenhouse gases. This is what we propose, and we call it Food Sovereignty.

And to achieve that we need social movements to work together and struggle together to put an end to the current false solutions that are today on the table at the climate negotiations. This is a must, otherwise we will face an even bigger tragedy worldwide. We, as social movements, have to bring our own agenda onto the table, because we are the first climate victims and climate refugees and therefore climate justice is in our hands.

At the FAO Food Summit in 1996, governments committed themselves to reduce hunger by half by 2015. The reality is that the number of hungry people has recently increased dramatically. We do not want the same thing to happen with the climate talks and see the emissions increase even further regardless of what the governments negotiate within the UNFCCC.

We invite all the movements present in Copenhagen to join together to bring climate justice to the table. Climate justice will only be achieved through solidarity and social justice.

Copenhagen, 7th December 2009

The honorable members of the ICC – leaders in La Via Campesina,
The delegations in La Via Campesina conference,
The leaders from UNAC,
The representatives of various social movements and the representatives of progressive governments,

I also specially express my grattitude to Sr. Armando Emilio Guebuza, the honorable President of Mozambique that is now with us in our important event

Ladies and gentlemen,

The V Conference that we are holding now is the highest assembly for La Via Campesina, the International peasants movement, in terms of making decisions and is being held once every four years. The respective conference is a very important and long-awaited meeting because in this conference we we will analyze how far is the development of our organization of struggle since the IV Conference which was being held on 2004 in Itaici, Sao Paolo, Brazil. in the IV Conference, we have established the strategy and the actions that we have to exercise.

My brothers and sisters,

Our conference in Mozambique now is reflecting both our political decision and our effort as La Via Campesina to extend and strengthen the struggle of the La Via Campesina and the peasants in Africa. Africa is very special for us. Up to today in Africa, majority of the people are living in the countryside and make their living from agriculture. We also know that our brothers and sisters in Africa, just like our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world, are living in a very dangerous situation.

If we do not conduct integral and consistent changes, this condition will become worse in the future. This could be seen in the increase of the world famine level upon the last 20 years. The increasing famine level is a consequence of neoliberalism policies which are adopted and practiced in almost every countries of the world, and the peak of the famine is the food crisis which happened in the early 2008. We could see the long queue in order to acquire foods and food riots are almost everywhere. Many lives are lost all over the place because of the neverending crave for food.

My brothers and sisters, the saviours of life

Along the years of 2004-2008, we have made guidelines of our organization regarding to how to implement our strategy and programs, which comprise:
1.    Simultaneously strengthening our organization of struggle through various educations, peaceful actions, mysticas, building the solidarity among our members, creating a clearer division of tasks and responsibilities, drafting progressive internal ruling, and many more!
2.    Defining, practicing and campaigning various alternative concepts and the concrete examples on how to overcome problems in the world. We have produced various of life-saving concept such as agrarian reform, food sovereignty, biodiversity, gender equality, small peasant family based sustainable agriculture, and the rights of the peasants.
3.    Building a strong alliance with other social movements and practicing a dignified communication practice to the government and various international institutions.
4.    We have succeeded in positioning our organization in the frontline of the struggle against various policies and organizations practising neoliberal policies.

My brothers and sisters, the defender of justice

In terms of stregthening our organization, we have also succeeded! This could be seen from several results that we have achieved, namely:

•    The numbers of La Via Campesina members in Asia are increasing and the members of the respective region are very dynamic, giving a distinctive colour for the La Via Campesina during this period.
•    Our struggles in Europe are getting more well-consolidated and they are getting closer to each other in the international relations.
•    The companer@s in Latin America region are getting more creative, having a more concrete network of solidarity, and continuously able to inspire the struggle that is very valuable for the movements in other regions.
•    From our friendship with the comrades in North America, we finally know exactly that neoliberalism is also undermining the life of the rural people in America—especially the United States, we are getting to know better about what is happening now is not a confrontation between one society and other societies or between one country over another, but the confrontation is happening between people on one side and the opression of neoliberal regime on the other side.
•    In the africa, we are welcoming a new region of the La Via Campesina in the continent.
•    And besides the dynamics that are happening in the La Via Campesina regions, we also should not forget about the development in the West and Central Asia, where we already have heartful friends that are very enthusiastic to plant the seeds of the struggle, together with us, to save the life on earth. Welcome to this conference. I surely can not wait to see your contribution in giving more colours to our struggle in the near future.

Today and in the future, we have to build our organization continuously. we are certain of this because the youth have shown a great spirit, as we have seen in the last 3 days. Therefore, we must develop our program in building the schools for the youths, like what we have organized in Venezuela.

In order to strengthen the struggle and the organization, we have to continuously develop our capability to find dignified ways to achieve our goals. We have to try to find them in anything we do! haven’t we in hong kong—in the middle of concrete jungle which surely different from our home—developed and consistently held the 7 principles of our struggle action? Those principles are the key of success to our struggle! We are creating common principles and we are also able to uphold them! Viva La Via Campesina!

One of the power of our organization is the existence of a great solidarity amongst our members. We have endured the test upon the strength of our organization and the solidarity of our members so far! It was via a great solidarity during one of the most devastating natural disasters of the century: The tsunami! Together, we have also built the solidarity upon the violation of human rights.

In terms of the struggle, we are fighting for alternative ways to save the live upon the earth, and currently we have achieved the results which now make us proud.

In the agrarian reform struggle, we have succeeded in bringing the issue of back to the surface. This issue has been freezed for some time. Even in some countries agrarian reform is totally prohibited to be discussed. But now the condition has changed! Agrarian reform has become an agenda in the FAO which can be implemented by the FAO member states.

In the struggle of upholding the food sovereignty, right now the food sovereignty has become  an alternative and concrete solution in overcoming the current food crisis.

In the theme of the struggle on the rights of the peasants, the rights of the peasants have started to be acknowledged by many parties as a central struggle theme that has to be continuously struggled–in order to eradicate the violence against the peasants man and women. In this period, we have produced a Declaration on the Rights of the Peasants as the basis to an upcoming International Convention on the respective rights. Besides struggling for the rights to be institutionalized in a convention, with the spirit of the respective rights, we have been and will be holding solidarity actions regarding violations of the rights of the peasants.

In several themes of struggle, we are gaining progressive results as well, just like in the struggle to save the biodiversity and genetic resources, the struggles to achieve gender equality, in the struggles for small peasant family based sustainable agriculture, et cetera.

My brothers and sisters, the inhabitants of the earth!

We are fully aware that the key to the success of our struggle relies on building a vast alliance where we support each other. Alliances between us as the peasants on one side and the consumers, women movements, environmentalists, fisher folks, labours, human rights activists, migrant workers, journalists, academicians, doctors and with the students on the other side where we all dream to save the planet and create a world full of justice.

The alliance that we are building is not a nonsense. We could see the concrete example in the struggle for food sovereignty. We have started it on the beginning of the last year in Selingue, Mali, by holding the Nyeleni forum as a forum for the social movements in the world to uphold food sovereignty. We can do that because we have the experience in building a broad alliance: We have proven this in Rome by the creation of IPC and other alliance building that we have done, for example with the Our World Is Not For Sale), and the Climate Justice.

In this great opportunity, i would also like to express my sincere grattitude to the La Via CampesinaLa Via Campesina’s allies for your high level of trust in us, the small peasants and small landless farm labours, as your friends in the struggle. Once again, i really thank you all! Let us together change the world to be a better and a place full of justice.

My brothers and sisters, men and women with noble souls,

Thanks to the hard work that we have done, we have succeeded in placing our organization in the frontline on facing the neoliberal forces and institutions.

In this honorable opportunity, we have to have belief with all our heart, that we are the force of change. The existence of the WTO that was historically considered as a must, now we can see that the WTO is walking under the shadow of death. People used to be so obedient to implement the principles of Washington Consensus–but now we can see that the pillars of the consensus are falling apart with the financial institutions collapse throughout the world. We have succeeded to demoralize the WTO, and now the WTO has also collapsed.

Upon the World Bank and the IMF, we have succeeded to prove their fatal mistake and in inspiring various parties to create new alternatives, new hopes and a new world.

Our principle to stay in the frontline of the struggle against neoliberalism keeps our confidence high in conducting political communication with various parties in various levels.

In this period, several members of La Via CampesinaLa Via Campesina in some regions have extended the scope of their struggle by building political communication and cooperation with the governments who agree with our principles and sympathetic upon our movement. In some countries in Latin America, the conception of food sovereignty are starting to be implemented and the agrarian reform is starting to be exercised.

La Via Campesina right now is in the frontline position to fight neoliberalism, and of course we achieved that with extremely heavy efforts which require sacrifices. Therefore, to show our respect, we would like to pay our respect to the following parties:

1.    Brothers and sisters who have been struggling in Hong Kong who have fearlessly stated that the WTO has to go down! Although Mr. Lee Kyung-Hae is gone, his seeds of struggle grows with us, (applause please) Down down WTO!
2.    Brothers and sisters who have been struggling in Jakarta against the World Bank and the IMF (please give your applause)
3.    Brothers and sisters who have been struggling against the G8 in Hokkaido and Rostock, applause again! No more G8! G8 Iranai!
4.    My brothers and sisters who have been struggling in the Andean mountain struggling to defense the dignity of the indigenous people (please applause) Land, territory and dignity!
5.    My brothers and sisters in the depth of Brazil who are rejecting the green desert, and brothers and sisters in the other parts of America (applause please)
6.    My brothers and sisters, young and old that have been and is still struggling in Europe against the GMO which is destroying the earth and the humankind. Please applause for our friends in Europe!
7.    My brothers and sisters who have been living in one of the highest world’s civilization, in South Asia, who are continuously on a huge scale rejecting the free trade. Please give our appreciation to our comerades in South Asia!
8.    In this great oportunity, i also would like to express a very extraordinary thing, the La Via Campesina women movement! A movement that we must feel proud of. La lucha continua!
9.    I also express my greatest grattitude to the people who will continue the life upon the earth: the youth, male and female who have strong commitments to be peasants. Their faith is giving us all the optimism and the hope that we could save all the live on the planet. Please give applause for our youth, the next generation of La Via Campesina!

My brothers and sisters whom i am proud of,

In accordance to our slogan, we have to continuously globalize the struggle so that our brothers and sisters who are beginning to lose hope could arise against the opression and the impoverishing which are led by the current neoliberal regimes.

We have to continue struggling against the crisis in every sector which are being planted by the neoliberal regimes! We have to stop all of the nonsense: The neoliberal regime propaganda! Don’t be swayed away by their sweet but viscious words.

The peasant community has to say no loudly to all of the false projects under the banner of saving the earth: Say no to the falseness of agrofuel! Say no to the green revolution! Say no to the green desert! Say no to the market-friendly land reform! Say no to the sale of our life!

Our brothers and sisters who are walking in the path of salvation,

Therefore, this conference is one path to overcome all of the crises that are happening today. This conference is a conference that will ensure that the social transformation process will be done based on the principles of justice in life which we uphold in La Via Campesina. In accordance with the name of this organization: the path of peasants as the way of life. The path that leads to salvation.

I’m sure that this conference will be a succesful one, since i believe that the spirit of our brothers and sisters, the peasants of Mozambique, is living in our heart. The spirit of the people–the spirit of the peasant communities of Mozambique which fearlessly drove the colonization away from the land of the country. Of course such spirit against colonialism is still alive and it has to be fired-up continuously to drive the new forms of colonization that come to this country.
In this glorious chance, it is an obligation to express my greatest gratittude to all the ICC members of La Via Campesina 2004-2008 period, especially to my comrades Paul nicholson and Egidio Brunetto and to all parties involved which are impossible to be mentioned one by one in this opportunity. I express my grattitude! We are sure that our brothers and sisters will keep on struggling under the umbrella of La Via Campesina. We will also keep on remembering our leaders who have passed away, Prof. Swami, Hege Nerland, and lots of other La Via Campesina leaders that I could not mention here.

Before I end this opening speech,i would like to specifically propose to the government of Mozambique to implement the principles of food sovereignty! For Africa, we must also have a strong intention to overcome the current food crisis by struggling to realize the concept of food sovereignty in the level of public policy. Why? Because concretely in the level of peasant family and rural community, the concept of food sovereignty can really be applied. Therefore it should also be struggled in the conceptual level. We can not let the African leaders of to be swayed by the Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) project which we already knew has shown failures in overcoming famine in the continent. And it just not only failed, it also created new problems everywhere.

Therefore, we hope that a series of policies could be created to uphold the food sovereignty; organize the food import in a certain strong manner so that the national and local food system can be protected, ensure that the land produce healthy and nutritious foods through the hands of our peasants family, fertilize the Mozambican land through agroecology, support the peasants family cooperatives so that they can save the economy of the peasants, and of the Mozambique as a whole, and build the national character of the peasants and the Mozambican people  so that they could become a nation-state with dignity!

I also express my greatest thanks to the willingness of UNAC to become our host of the conference.

I am highly expecting the President of Mozambique to attend our conference and give his respective opening speech in the opening of this conference.

I hope our spirit to create a global justice is burning continuously.

GLOBALIZE THE HOPE, GLOBALIZE THE STRUGGLE!

VIVA LA VIA CAMPESINA!

Throughout the history of farming, peasants and villagers haveobtained energy from their farmland to fulfil their daily needs.Peasant families are used to using the oil extracted from thecoconut (copra) to light lamps in their houses. Even now peasantfamilies still use biomass to make firewood for cooking meals.They collect the branches that fall from trees and dry bushesduring their day working on their farmland. The technology ofusing biogas that is processed from animal waste is also verycommon in peasant communities. Other sources of kinetic energyfrom rivers such as small micro hydro electric generators are alsovery common in rural areas. These are some examples on howpeasants explore natural alternatives, extracting and generatingenergy from their farmland.

For some centuries we did not have any problems because of theexistence of these models of getting energy from farmland. This isrenewable energy because peasants could always get it almost likethey could harvest fruits from the trees. Peasants needed thiskind energy and they were able to produce it in integration withother farming activities in the farmland.

Agrofuels have become an increasingly important issue in theserecent years. The issue become very significant because big oilcompanies need another resources of fuel to complement crude oilbased fuels. This idea did not originate with peasants. Before wefurther discuss agrofuels it is important to expand a little bitabout food sovereignty so we can start the analysis from what hasbeen happening with peasant based agriculture.

Via Campesina does not follow the concept and policy of foodsecurity that is promoted by FAO because it does not fit in withthe realities of peasant farming. Even more La Via Campesina seeit as potentially creating big problems for the people of theworld, and first and foremost for peasants and small farmers.

Via Campesina reject the policy and the concept of food securitythat only guarantee that every mouth is fed. It does not addresssome basic principles of the food system like: who should producefood, how food is being produced and distributed, who shouldbenefit from the food system and how to secure sustainablerelationship between the peasant and the consumer. In short, foodsecurity just wants to accommodate the interests of agribusinesscorporations and trans-national agribusiness corporations (TNCs).Peasants do not want the meaning of food and agriculture to bereduced to only a matter of commodities in markets, and to be subject to the free market. By reducing the meaning of food to acommodity, only those who have money will be able to have accessto food.

We do not want markets to determine food production andconsumption, we want peasants and consumers to be those who decideon and control food because most of the producers and consumers offood in the world are actually peasant families. We do not want acompetitive world food system which will destroy the sovereigntyof countries mandated to feed their people. Therefore La ViaCampesina struggles to take the WTO out of agriculture.

We fight against the neo-liberal food system because instead ofmaking the food system stronger by protecting the peasants whoproduce food and giving more protection under the right of food,it create the food crisis; soaring food prices and creating hungereverywhere as is happening now.

In Indonesia’s case, there has been a lot of investment on palmoil plantations. In the beginning the objective was to export thepalm oil as crude palm oil (CPO) and process it into cooking oilfor the national market. Many international agribusinesscorporations have started palm oil plantations which have led tomany land conflict cases with the peasant movement in Indonesia.This is because these plantations have been started on communaland peasant-owned lands. The plantations are operated on amonoculture model, by doing so contributing to many naturaldisasters; the extinction of biodiversity, water scarcity duringthe drought season and severe floods and land slides during therainy season. Many peasants have had to live as landless peasantsand have been forced to work as daily or weekly cheap labour.

While the issue of agrofuel production is escalating around theworld, the government of Indonesia is promoting palm oilplantation by inviting further investment. They do not care aboutthe fact that most of the peasants hold an average of jus 0.3hectares of land. Worse, as the international price of palm oil isincreasing, companies are exporting their production and makingthe price of edible oil in the national market increasedramatically. The government can’t do more than just make newregulations which ask companies to decrease their export volume.This doesn’t help much, because corporations are more interestedin their profits. As an impact, food riots have occurred in manyplaces because people were forced to wait for the subsidizedprogram of edible oil. Women and children have had to stand inqueues under the sun for extended periods holding their couponsand people have become incensed and begun to riot. It is a morethan ironic situation where Indonesia is the second greatestproducer of palm oil but people do not benefit from it at all.
The existing agrofuel program makes the food system worse. Afterthe liberalization of food markets forced a win and lose gamebetween competing countries, now peasants compete with cars.

Via Campesina believe in the principle of Genuine Agrarian Reformwhich would make sure that peasants have enough land through landdistribution. Because by only having control over land canpeasants guarantee food for their families and local communities.And by implementation of Food Sovereignty, peasants are convincedthat they can feed the world.

To: Mr. Yasuo Fukuda, Prime Minister of Japan, President of the G8

To: Mr. John W. Ashe, Permanent UN representative, Antigua and Barbuda’s Permanent and Chairman of the Group of 77

From: Henry Saragih, International Coordinator for La Via Campesina

Jakarta, April 28, 2008

OPEN LETTER

Concrete measures are needed to strengthen peasant and farmer-based food production; the food price crisis exposes the instability of liberalized agricultural markets.

Dear Mr. Diouf, Mr. Fukuda,  and Mr. Ashe,

Our movement, La Via Campesina, consists of millions of small farmers and landless workers in more than 60 countries around the world. Although we are the ones producing food for our families and communities, many of us are hungry or living in poverty. Over the last months, the situation has worsened due to the sudden rise in food prices. We are also severely hit by the crisis because many of us do not have enough land to feed our families, and because most producers do not benefit from those high prices.  Large traders, speculators, supermarkets and industrial farms are cashing in on and benefitting from this crisis.

This current food crisis is the result of many years of deregulation of agricultural markets, the privatization of state regulatory bodies and the dumping of agricultural products on the markets of developing countries. According to the FAO, liberalized markets have attracted huge cash flows that seek to speculate on agricultural products on the “futures” markets and other financial instruments.

The corporate expansion of agrofuels and the initially enthusiastic support for agrofuels in countries such as the US, EU and Brazil have added to the expectation that land for food will become more and more scarce. On top of this in many southern countries hundreds of thousands of hectares are converted from agricultural uses in an uncontrolled way for so-called economic development zones, urbanization and infrastructure. The ongoing land grabbing by Transnational Companies (TNCs) and other speculators will expel millions more peasants who will end up in the mega cities where they will be added to the ranks of the hungry and poor in the slums. Besides this, we may expect especially in Africa and South Asia more severe droughts and floods caused by global climate change. These are severe threats for the rural as well as for the urban areas.

These are highly worrying developments that need active and urgent action! We need a fundamental change in the approach to food production and agricultural markets!

Time to rebuild national food economies!
Rebuilding national food economies will require immediate and long-term political commitments from governments. An absolute priority has to be given to domestic food production in order to decrease dependency on the international market. Peasants and small farmers should be encouraged through better prices for their farm products and stable markets to produce food for themselves and their communities. Landless families from rural and urban areas have to get access to land, seeds and water to produce their own food. This means increased investment in peasant and farmer-based food production for domestic markets.

Governments have to provide financial support for the poorest consumers to allow them to eat. Speculation and extremely high prices forced upon consumers by traders and retailers have to be controlled. Peasants and small farmers need better access to their domestic markets so that they can sell food at fair prices for themselves and for consumers.

Countries need to set up intervention mechanisms aimed at stabilizing market prices. In order to achieve this, import controls with taxes and quotas are needed to avoid low-priced imports which undermine domestic production. National buffer stocks managed by the state have to be built up to stabilize domestic markets: in times of surplus, cereals can be taken from the market to build up the reserve stocks and in case of shortages, cereals can be released.

Regulating international markets and supporting countries to strengthen their food production

At the international level, stabilization measures also have to be undertaken. International buffer stocks have to be built up and an intervention mechanism put in place to stabilize prices on international markets at a reasonable level. Exporting countries have to accept international rules to control the quantities they can bring to the market, in order to stop dumping. The right to implement import controls, set up programs to support the poorest consumers, implement agrarian reform and invest in domestic, farmer peasant-based food production has to be fully respected and supported at the international level.

We ask the FAO, based on its mandate, to take the initiative and create the political environment for a fundamental change in food policies. In the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD) a broad majority of governments recognized and agreed on the importance of rural development and agrarian reform to combat poverty and hunger in the rural areas. The International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), an assessment of the agricultural sector that involved Civil Society organizations, the private sector, and governments as well as the FAO and the World Bank came to the conclusion that corporate-led agriculture and the increasing dependence of peasants and small farmers is at the heart of the problem. They also concluded that peasant, and farmer-based sustainable agriculture has to be supported and strengthened. The International Fund on Agricultural Development (IFAD) also recognizes the key role of peasants and small farmers in the production of food.

We request that G8 governments allow these initiatives to be taken. They should stop the promotion of agrofuels as these are no solution for the climate crisis and add to the destruction of forests. Especially in the southern countries, agrofuels occupy millions of hectares that should remain available for food production.

We also demand that the G8 analyze critically their own agricultural policies, take initiatives to stop the ongoing volatility of the international markets and shift their financial support away from industrial agriculture towards sustainable family farmer-based food production.
We also demand that the G8 stop and cancel any free trade agreements that will only contribute to the destruction of food production in developing countries and block any possibility of autonomous industrial development.

The influence of transnational corporations and financial speculative interests has to be controlled as much as possible and kept away from the the international food market. Food is too important to be left to business alone.

A possible WTO agreement in the Doha Round will mean another blow for peasant-based food production.  We demand that the governments of the G77 assess again the WTO negotiations on agriculture in the Doha round and reject any agreement that has negative implications for domestic food production and does not allow the taking of all necessary measures to strengthen food production and increase national self sufficiency.

Peasants and small farmers are the main food producers

La Via Campesina is convinced that peasants and small farmers can feed the world. They have to be the key part of the solution. With sufficient political will and the implementation of adequate policies, more peasants and small farmers, men and women, will easily  produce sufficient food to feed the growing population. The current situation shows that changes are needed!

The time for Food Sovereignty has come!

Yours sincerely,

Henry Saragih
International Coordinator for La Via Campesina

Henry Saragih, international coordinator of La Via Campesina, opened the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development today in the name of the civil society forum. La Via Campesina is a global movement of peasants, small-scale farmers, indigenous people, landless, women’s and rural workers’ organizations.

More than 150 leaders of the movement from  Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas gathered for the forum along with thousands of members of Via Campesina Brazil.

Please find the transcription speech below:

For more information:
Daniel Cassol : 51 9944 8407
Isabelle Delforge: 51 8178 9855
www.viacampesina.org

SPEECH TEXT

I am Henry Saragih, international Co-ordinator of La Via Campesina and I bring the voice of the Forum on Land Territory and Dignity that is taking place parallel to this Governmental Conference.

A genuine and integrated Agrarian Reform that redistributes land of the big properties to the landless and allows access to and control over natural and productive resources is crucial to eradicate poverty and misery in the rural areas. Without an Agrarian Reform it is impossible to achieve these goals.

At the moment, peasant-based food production, artisanal fisheries, pastoralism and the management of natural resources by communities and indigenous people is also severely threatened by the expansion of corporate-based development and the neo-liberal policies of the World Bank, IMF and WTO. Therefore it is crucial to maintain and strengthen the control by communities over these resources based on the principle of food sovereignty.

FAO´s mission is to eradicate hunger and poverty in the rural areas. Therefore we expect a strong commitment of FAO on this issue.

We demand that the member states of FAO, our national governments, take the necessary steps to define an international plan of action that requires governments to implement a genuine integrated agrarian reform that guarantees the following:
-    Active participation and respect and support for the initiatives of organisations and movements (landless, indigenous, peasants, fisher folk) towards a genuine agrarian reform,
-    National legislation to protect and enhance a genuine agrarian reform,
-    Definition and implementation of a national plan of action
-    A commitment to reserve and spend the necessary funds to establish and strengthen the necessary institutional instruments
-    A commitment to establish policies to realize adequate control over natural resources by the communities concerned.

We expect the national governments and FAO to set up a preparation process at the international level to allow the broad and full participation of organisations and movements of those affected as well as an in-depth preparation at the governmental level in order achieve results responding to these needs. The International Planning Committee for Food sovereignty should continue to play its central role in facilitating this process.

We feel that this Conference, given  the lack of engagement by governments and the enormous difficulties that we had to organize serious participation of Civil Society,  cannot be the moment to finalize international commitments on such an important issue for the coming years. We demand that this Conference should be just the first step in this process.

Therefore we propose that the Conference decides in its final resolution to begin this process, to increase the capacity in FAO regarding agrarian reform, to insist that FAO take leadership on this issue and that governments, especially the developed countries, free up sufficient means to implement a broad, open, participatory process for an international plan of action that effectively leads to the implementation of a genuine, integrated agrarian reform.

If we want to eradicate poverty and misery in this world we need engagement, courage, political will, and the necessary solidarity to achieve the urgently needed changes.

We cannot wait another 30 years!
Land for Life, Land for Dreams, Land to Affirm our Dignity, NOW!