17 april

This April 17th we demand that the Peasants rights are guaranteed. Enough of FTAs, enough impunity

17 April 2018  Free Trade Agreements

(Sepultura, April 17th 2018) After two decades of Free Trade Agreements (FTA) advance in an attempt to recolonize and; 22 years after the de Eldorado dos Carajás massacre in Brazil, La Via Campesina denounces the accomplice impunity and calls to resist in an organized way, these treaties that try to take over of our natural resources and local markets, for the benefit of the transnational capital and of the agribusiness with the States as its silent concealer.

This April 17th International Day of Peasant´s Struggle, the organization members and allies of La Via Campesina organize hundreds of unified and decentralized actions in a global scale, for the right to land and water, against the Free Trade Agreement and against the criminalization of the social struggle saying: Enough FTA, enough impunity!

The FTAs are more than just commerce, they are integral agreements that forbid that structural reforms are made, strengthening the transnational corporations (International legally binding instrument on transnational corporations (TNCs) and other business enterprises with respect to human rights., the economic interests of the national elite and the governments; promoting their global objectives, commercializing water, the Land, and the seeds, going over life itself. The FTAs are done between two or more governments and are out of the World Trade Organization even though they are tools of neoliberal organization.

And this is how mistrust grows for the FTAs, the mobilization and resistance does also, today our organizations all around the world have organized countless actions to denounce the effects of FTAs on the peasants and the Food Sovereignty. The Via Campesina European Coordinator, ECVC, on this global action day demands the European Union: Free the peasants from Free Trade Agreements!

About the FTA that is being negotiated at this time between EU and Mercosur affirms that “these treaties are a fatal blow to us, small and medium farmers already in a situation of crisis. But also this treaty also generalizes social and environmental dumping: the expansion of the agroindustry in detriment of the peasant communities.”

On her behalf, the Latin-American Coordinator of Peasant Organizations (CLOC) la Via Campesina in latin America this April 17th calls to struggle againsts the impunity resisisting and building new alternatives in the territories demanding a popular agrarian reform that guarantees the sovereignty of the people.

Additionally in this action day The Global Action Coordinator Committee of the Via Campesina will gather in Korea, in this context, The International Forum about the impact of the FTA in agriculture organized by la Via Campesina southeast and East of Asia. This forum will give numerous examples on the impacts of FTAs, and in particular on the free trade agreement between the European Union and Indonesia currently being negotiated.

For Kim-Jeong-Yeol of the Korean Women Peasant Association “Even though WTO has failed in their multi-lateral agreement still functions as world police of the neoliberal Free Trade Agreement. And with the FTA the corporations and States are attempting against the peasantry. The WTO, WB, IMF never work for the peasants, for this reason we think they should disappear.

La Via Campesina this day also denounces the systematic violations of the peasants fundamental rights that could be alarming, in countries like Brazil, Paraguay, Honduras, Colombia among others thousands of peasants are murdered with total impunity. In Indonesia, Thailand, India, Sri Lanka, The Philippines and Pakistan, many violations of peasants’ rights also occur. These incidents tend to aggravate because of the FTAs that are exclusively to the service of the corporations and the capital. This is why in this context we demand a “Declaration of Peasants Rights and other persons to work in the countryside. “

Even though, the FTA strengthen the land and water grabbing, and destroy the local markets to put at risk the food sovereignty all together. And the effects are far wider and promote the privatization of public services as well. Like health services, medicine, telecommunications, energy, the water supply provisions, – among others- opening vast areas to foreign investment. In many cases the signatory governments are forced to reform their laws, with linked compromises to not step back: The protection of the investments forbids an agrarian reform, because it puts investment protection over national democratic decisions. Through such agreements, the companies strengthen their power to influence redaction of policies and regulations that can affect their associate countries.

Mobilize!

This April 17th join the different mobilizations united to struggle for a systematic change, defending the land, territories and food sovereignty for the people, saying: No to FTAs and global capitalism! No FTA benefits the working class, we must eradicate them not reform them”!

We feed our people and build movement to change world!

The report of VII Conference is now available on line here

Press contacts:

Nury Martínez – Fensuagro Colombia – La Vía Campesina South America – Spanish: +573107720098
Federico Pacheco – SOC España – La Vía Campesina Europe – French: +34690651046
Kim Jeong-Yeol – Korean Women Peasant Association– La Vía Campesina Asia – English: +821048117996