The Pastoral Land Commission (CPT) has launched their new annual report, entitled 'Conflicts in the Countryside - Brazil 2021'. Since 1985, the CPT has been recording the violence inflicted on peoples and communities in the Brazilian countryside, by landowners, mining and forestry companies, land speculators and businessmen. It also shows the negligence and complicity of the State. From 1985 to 2020,…
At least 600,000 people in Chile face hunger, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s latest report on the state of food security and nutrition in the world (2021). This is significant in a population of 19.4 million people, and represents an increase of 57,000 people since 2006. Beyond hunger, between 2018-2020, 3.4 million Chilean people faced difficulties accessing…
Last year, between December 16 and December 21, various social and peasant organizations denounced the violent evictions that thousands of peasants were suffering in Aguán, Honduras. The situation was repeated a week later against members of the Cooperativa Remolino cooperative, who were evicted by private security guards and the COBRA squad who shot them with firearms, leaving at least 7…
“Today, peasants and farmers are facing extreme threats from the privatisation of seeds by intellectual property laws. In addition, seed marketing laws ban local and indigenous varieties which don’t fit the industrial model, restricting access and circulation. One institution is at the heart of this: the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV).” Hence the call…
The new edition of the Meat Atlas, published on 7 September 2021 by Friends of the Earth Europe, Heinrich-Böll Stiftung and BUND/Friends of the Earth Germany, reveals the role of the meat industry in the health, biodiversity and climate crises and the impacts of meat production on people, particularly communities in the Global South. “The Meat Atlas is a publication…
Three-quarters of those without access to electricity now live in Africa, a share that has risen over recent years. The economic effects of Covid-19 have only increased the number of people unable to access electricity and who were forced into energy poverty. In this context, Friends of the Earth Africa has launched a report that analyses this situation and outlines…
On April 28th, a National Strike started in Colombia. Since then, there have been massive demonstrations on the streets, spearheaded by women, youth, and Indigenous, peasant, and Black organizations. As president Iván Duque deployed the military to several important cities across the country, this increased the magnitude of the militarization, paramilitarism, and governance by Colombian police and military forces. On…
In early November, Elsa Nury Martínez, Chair of the National Agricultural Union Federation in Colombia (FENSUAGRO) and member of the Latin American Coordination of Rural Organisations (CLOC-Via Campesina), received death threats against her and her family. These threats came from the ‘Black Eagles’ narco-paramilitary group (Águilas Negras - Bloque Capital), who singled out the peasant leader as a military target…
On 10 September 2020, La Via Campesina will once again mark the International Day of Action against WTO and FTAs. On this day, in memory of Lee Kyung Hae’ sacrifice, LVC intend to hold a web-dialogue between peasant leaders and activists from Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. They will elaborate and argue why agriculture must remain out of all…
Since the beginning of 2020, at least 103 social leaders and defenders of territories, and 24 former FARC members undergoing a reinsertion process in line with the Peace Accords, have been murdered in Colombia, according to local NGO Indepaz. The Continental Day for Democracy and against Neoliberalism (La Jornada Continental), which represents different social movements and organisations, denounced the government…
