We are the solution, november 16th - media action in front of the FAO
Monday, 16th November
12.30 pm
Venue: in the tent in front of the FAO
Piazza di Porta Capena.
Small food producers are the solution to the food crisis. We will make our views known to the FAO. The time for food sovereignty is now!
Small farmers and others small food producers –like Indigenous Peoples - are more then 1.5 bilions in the world and they produce more than 75% of the world's food needs. We can cover 100% of the world's food needs through peasant agriculture and small scale livestock production and with artisinal fishing.
Contrary to what we are told, small-scale agriculture production is sufficient to feed the world; it also does not use the excessive amounts of oil that are required for industrial agriculture. This is why Nettie Weibe, of La Via Campesina, says that with local agriculture and local markets we can cool the planet.
She does however stress that this requires appropriate, fair and just policies that focus on providing genuine support to family agriculture. She says that it is urgent that lands be returned to the small-scale farmers. Real genuine agrarian reform, which has been put on hold for decades, would do far more for the climate that any deal that could result from the upcoming negotiations in Copenhagen.!
Weknow what to do and it is intolerable for over a billion people to be suffering from hunger. The majority of these - around 80 per cent - are small-scale food producers, Indigenous Peoples and rural workers that cannot survive on their work.
We also need public policies that place those producing the world's food at the centre, and include their active participation. Measures must be adopted to achieve people's food sovereignty and the rights of peoples to control their natural resources must be respected.
At the opening of the Forum both the Mayor of Rome, Mr. Gianni Alemanno, and the Director General of the FAO, Mr. Jacques Diouf, recognized that answers to the food crisis and the climate crisis lie with the rural movements. Now, at the World Summit there is an opportunity for them to stand by their words.
To demand our rights, and to show that we can feed and cool the planet, more than 500 representatives of civil society from all over the world are organizing a meaningful and imaginative event to show the Heads of State that this is possible.
We invite you in the front of the FAO, Piazza di Porta Capena for a press meeting on:
Ban GMOs,
Stop financial speculation on foods,
End the new farmland grab,
Refuse agrofuels,
Put an end to industrial fishing!
Indigenous Peoples food production system as a contribution to the future
Food sovereignty now!!!
Contacts for the press: 349 0068499 / 334 8962734
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The statement of Herman Kumara, World Forum of Fisher Peoples for the People’s Food Sovereignty Forum, Rome.
We declare that the human rights of fishing communities are indivisible and that the development of responsible and sustainable small-scale and indigenous fisheries is possible only if their political, civil, social, economic and cultural rights are addressed in an integrated manner;
We fisher people, recognizing that all rights and freedoms apply equally to all men and women in fishing communities and recognizing the continued contribution of women in maintaining the resilience of small-scale fishing communities;
We, declare that dependence of fishing communities on aquatic and coastal living natural resources is shaped by the need to meet life and livelihood in their struggle to eradicate poverty, to secure their well-being as well as to express their cultural and spiritual values;
We recognize the complementarity and interdependency of fisheries- related activities within fishing communities; and
Recognize the interconnectedness between the health and wellbeing of coastal communities and of aquatic ecosystems;
We hereby call upon the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), other United Nations agencies, regional fisheries bodies and our respective national governments to:
Guarantee access rights of small-scale and indigenous fishing communities to territories, lands and waters on which they have traditionally depended for their life and livelihoods;
Recognize and implement the rights of fishing communities to restore, protect and manage local aquatic and coastal ecosystems
Establish small–scale fisheries as the preferred model for the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ);
Establish and enforce measures to prohibit industrial fishing in inshore waters;
Prohibit all destructive fishing practices and gears, and illegal fishing;
Reverse and prevent the privatization of fisheries resources, as through individual transferable quotas (ITQs) and similar systems that promote property rights;
Reverse and prevent the displacement of fishing communities through the privatization of waters and lands of fishing communities for activities that include tourism, aquaculture, defense /military establishments, conservation and industry;
The declaration, establishment and management of Marine protected areas (MPAs) should bindingly involve the active participation of local communities and small-scale fishers.
Ensure the integration of traditional and indigenous knowledge and customary law in fisheries management decision-making;
Guarantee the equal participation of small-scale and indigenous fishing communities in fisheries and coastal management decision-making, ensuring their free, prior and informed consent to all management decisions;
Recognize the traditional fishing rights of small-scale and indigenous fishers from immediately neighboring adjacent States and set up appropriate bilateral arrangements for protecting their rights;
Protect all marine and inland water bodies from all forms of pollution, and reclamation;
Reject industrial aquaculture and genetically modified and exotic species in aquaculture;
Recognize, promote and protect the diversified livelihood base of fishing communities.
Herman Kumara, , No.10, Malwatta Road, Negombo, Sri Lanka.
15 November 2009
