Via Campesina

Organisation
The International Peasant's Voice
Who is La Via Campesina
We are the international movement of peasants, small- and medium-sized producers, landless, rural women, indigenous people, rural youth and agricultural workers. We defend the values and the basic interests of our members. We are an autonomous, pluralist and multicultural movement, independent of any political, economic, or other type of affiliation. Our 148 members are from 69 countries from Asia, Africa, urope, and the Americas.

How was La Vía Campesina created?
In May of 1993, the First Conference of La Via Campesina was held in Mons, Belgium, where it was constituted as a world organization, and its first strategic guidelines and structure were defined. The Second International Conference was held in 1996 in Tlaxcala, Mexico; the third in 2000 in Bangalore, India; and the fourth in 2004 in Sao Paolo, Brazil.

What is our main objective?
The principal objective of La Via Campesina is to develop solidarity and unity among small farmer organizations in order to promote gender parity and social justice in fair economic relations; the preservation of land, water, seeds and other natural resources; food sovereignty; sustainable agricultural production based on small and medium-sized producers.

What do we defend?

Peasant, family farm-based production
La Via Campesina promotes a model of peasant or family-farm agriculture based on sustainable production with local resources and in harmony with local culture and traditions. Peasants and farmers rely on a long experience with their locallyavailable resources. We are capable of producing the optimal quantity and quality of food with few external inputs. Our production is mainly for family consumption and domestic markets.


People's food sovereignty
Food sovereignty is the RIGHT of peoples, countries, and state unions to define their agricultural and food policy without the “dumping” of agricultural commodities into foreign countries. Food sovereignty organizes food production and consumption according to the needs of local communities, giving priority to production for local consumption. Food sovereignty includes the right to protect and regulate the national agricultural and livestock production and to shield the domestic market from the dumping of agricultural surpluses and low-price imports from other countries. Landless people, peasants, and small farmers must get access to land, water, and seed as well as productive resources and adequate public services. Food sovereignty and sustainability are a higher priority than trade policies.


Decentralized food production and supply chains
The current industrialized agribusiness model has been deliberately planned for the complete vertical integration and to dominate all agriculture activities. This model exploits workers and concentrates economic and political power. La Via Campesina advocates a decentralized model where production, processing, distribution and consumption are controlled by the people the communities themselves and not by transnational corporations.

Events
To globalize the struggle against injustice and neoliberalism worldwide, La Via Campesina has two important dates:
1. 17th of April: The international peasant struggle day People all around the world will commemorate the killing of 19 peasants struggling for land reform in Eldorado dos Carajas (Brazil) on April 17, 1996.

2. 10th of September: The international struggle day against WTO.
On that date in 2003, Mr. Lee Kyun Hae, a Korean peasant, stabbed himself to death during a massive protest against the WTO in Cancun, Mexico. He was holding a banner saying “WTO kills farmers”.

Cat Ferry News and Comments

NS: Protest fails to turn the tide for Yarmouth ferry
By Carla Allen & Tina Comeau, Transcontinental Media

Source: The Vanguard, Feb. 5, 2010

[YARMOUTH, NS] — The mood aboard the buses was merry on the way up. Hopeful. However, dejection was a palpable emotion on the way back amongst those who made the long trek to Halifax Thursday morning. It was a last ditch attempt to have the provincial government reverse its decision to subsidize ferry service between Yarmouth and Maine.


Buses loaded at 6 a.m. for the trip to Halifax. — Carla Allen photo

At least 100 passengers from Yarmouth, Digby and Shelburne counties joined Bay Ferries employees, CAW members, business operators, ferry supporters and municipal politicians from other parts of the Maritimes in front of the legislature, to form a crowd of close to 250.

Ian Hurst, president and CEO of Rodd Hotels and Resorts was emcee for a line up of a dozen speakers. He said, following the announcement of The Cat service cancellation, the Rodd Grand Hotel immediately started to feel the repercussions with bus tours cancelling visits and the loss of 1,000 room nights for this season.

Overall, the anticipated job losses in Yarmouth County — between Bay Ferries employees, hotels, restaurants and other businesses that rely on The Cat — are reported to be 500 or more. The predictions are that without ferry service this year, the fallout will be disastrous on the local tourism industry and will impact all of the province, as the majority of people who travel to Yarmouth via The Cat spend their vacation in other parts of the province.

Organizers for the ferry rally had requested Economic Development Minister Percy Paris to address the crowd, which at one point surged inside One Government Place chanting “Darrell, Darrell, Darrell.” They were asked by police to go back outside. As it turned out, the premier was on vacation that day and not in Halifax.

Minister Paris refused to address the protesters but agreed to meet privately with a smaller delegation that included Town of Yarmouth mayor Phil Mooney.

“He said he’s not going to reverse his decision,” said Mooney following that meeting. “There were some very sad people that left that office.”

During the discussion Minister Paris suggested his department could help alleviate the lack of tourists in Yarmouth by putting up a sign in Digby so “maybe you can tap into the 100,000 people that go to the Wharf Rat Rally.”

“That was a disgraceful statement. I couldn’t believe it,” said Mooney. “They’ve cut the life right out of us.”
Tags:Bay Ferries, buses, Economic Development Minister Percy Paris, ferry service between Yarmouth and Maine, Ian Hurst, Premier Darrell Dexter, protest, rally, Rodd Hotels and Resorts, save the ferry, subsidize ferry service, The Cat, Yarmouth mayor Phil Mooney
Comments:
Shari Hastings Lucey
We will be driving the long way around to reach our vacation home in Nova Scotia this summer, but if there isn’t a ferry after that, we will consider selling our home. I am sure there are many others like us who will do the same thing. The summer home owners put a lot of money into the economy each year that may not be taken into account when you look at just the tourism figures. It is a sad time for Nova Scotia as I think losing the ferry is going to be devastating to an already suffering region.

Feb 5/2010
Brian
How does this idiot think alot of those people got to Southwest Nova to go to the Wharf Rat Rally in the first place…swim?!?!?!?

Feb 5/2010
Sandy
Thank you for getting that into the paper so people can see the really stupid things this man can say (and do)!
“Paris suggested his department could help alleviate the lack of tourists in Yarmouth by putting up a sign in Digby so “maybe you can tap into the 100,000 people that go to the Wharf Rat Rally.”

Feb 5/2010
Allan
I need some answers here.

This is the minister of Tourism?

He is telling the tourist industry they don’t know what they are talking about, a highway sign will solve the problem, that is why he wants to pay $3 million for the Cat not to run. His plan is to put up a sign?

I just want to be the first to say that if this sign thing really works we are going to look like fools don’t you think?

On the other hand if our new NDP minister of Tourism and Economic Development is telling us his only backup plan for destroying the south shore tourism industry and killing 500 jobs is a damn sign. I think he should be removed from office because that is not a plan.

That is stupid Percy, that makes chills run down my spine that your our guy to depend on to grow our industry? Does that sound like Darrel Dexter made a good choice for tourism to you?

The south shore is going to have a recession of it’s own this summer, like we have never seen. Low tourism, bankrupts, few summer jobs, fewer events, less people at the fewer events and tourism for us will suck. Economic development will suck.

This will all be the result of Percy Paris having a plan to use one sign to compensate for the loss of a service that has run forever in our eyes.

Does anyone else feel he was a bad choice for minister?

I do and I am going to be force to suffer threw it.

My god give us hope, for hope is all we have left.

Feb 5/2010

The Honorable Percy Paris
Econ.Minister et.al
NS Legislature
Halifax NS

Honorable and Dear Sir:

I watched with great sadness on TV yesterday, hundreds of people from so far away storming the nigh- on- to- sacrosanct- environs of democracy. Do you at all realize how sad that was? Grown men and women all but brought to their knees to be heard and honored too? But there was no such honor to be!

I was a young student in Halifax many years ago when the legs of democracy were pulled out from under
the feet of the people of Africville. How odd indeed after fifty years of denial of that great injustice, some tokenism in dollars-millions even- is being waved as the big fix before the black community while at the same time a similiar injustice is faced by the people of south west Nova Scotia.

The commonality,Sir? Participatory democracy had died then as now. The people of Africville were not asked but told, as now the people of Yarmouth and environs were told and not asked. The only word that comes to my mind to describe such an affront to people is bully!

What did the people expect to hear from you yesterday ,Sir? Hardly not that you would do nothing about it that day. That was a given. But what people want to hear from elected leaders is a word or two of hope to lift them out of the sense of hopelessness and despair in which you and your government have placed them.

If truth were known, the sense I get is that the Dexter Government is hell-bent on imposing a virtual genocide on the people of South Western Nova Scotia.

Now that's a legacy for generations half a century hence to look back on!

Shame on the Dexter government, while I search for the values of Tommy Douglas and the NDP. They are simply are not there.

Daniel Mills
Digby County Nova Scotia