International groups Pesticide Action Network Asia and the Pacific (PAN AP), the Coalition of Agricultural Workers International (CAWI) and the Asian Peasant Coalition (APC) welcomed the release of the Trade and Environment Review 2013 published by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) for stressing the need to achieve food sovereignty and empowering the poor to meet food security challenges as of one its key messages.

But at the same time, the groups pointed out that these need to translate to actual policy reforms and that the brightest hope in realizing them is with the strong and vibrant movement of small food producers.

“We welcome the report in so far as it contributes favorably to our position in the ongoing discourse on agriculture, development, poverty and hunger. As food sovereignty advocates, we welcome each opportunity and venue that allows us to articulate and amplify our basic assertions,” said PAN AP Executive Director Sarojeni Rengam.

Entitled “Wake up before it is too late: Make agriculture truly sustainable now for food security in a changing climate”, the 2013 report pointed out that realizing the need for a fundamental transformation and questioning some of the assumptions that had driven food, agricultural and trade policy in recent decades are starting to take place.

Unfortunately, priority remains focused on increasing industrial agricultural production, said the report, on the basis of the questionable assumption that the problem is supply-side productivity. But as the report narrated, “Hunger and malnutrition are mainly related to lack of purchasing power and/or inability of (the) rural poor to be self-sufficient. Meeting food security challenges is thus primarily about empowerment of the poor and their food sovereignty.”

According to the UNCTAD report, some 70% of around one billion people worldwide who chronically suffer from starvation are themselves small farmers or agricultural laborers.

“Many of the points raised in the UNCTAD report are actually not really new. Small, poor and landless farmers and farm workers already know and feel how it is like to be hungry even when they are the ones directly producing food. We have long been asserting that the lack of control of the direct producers over the means of production, especially land, is the culprit behind their poverty and hunger,” said Rahmat Ajiguna, Deputy Secretary General of APC.

As a document, UNCTAD describes Trade and Environment Review as a compilation of articles and commentaries by various experts to enhance understanding of and promote dialogue on the development dimension of key trade and environment issues. It does not reflect the official views or position of UNCTAD as an institution on the topics being discussed in the report.

“While some of the alternative and more progressive views are now and then being articulated in UN reports, much work still needs to be done. For one, the analyses and concrete proposals of civil society and social movements must translate to actual policy recommendations officially endorsed by the UN and other multilateral bodies and implemented by governments,” Rengam noted.

The PAN AP official cited as an example the issue of biofuels, whose current demand trends are being “regarded as given rather than challenging their rational”, according to the UNCTAD report. “There is an ongoing process in the Committee on World Food Security of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization wherein civil society inputs are supposed to feed in the drafting of policy recommendations. But these inputs are being ignored and blocked by powerful interests like the US and private corporations,” said Rengam.

For his part, CAWI Secretary General P.P. Sivapragasam said that organizing on the ground and the direct political actions of all small farmers, landless peasants, agricultural workers and all oppressed rural folks worldwide remain the key to achieving food sovereignty and genuine agrarian reform that will truly address hunger and poverty.

“We already know what the problems and the necessary solutions are. But we must build a movement to fight for these solutions – from the community level up to the international level. There is no substitute to strong and vibrant peasant struggles,” Sivapragasam stressed.

APC’s Ajiguna added, “Our unwavering struggles have already bore fruit in some peasant communities. In many countries in Asia, farmers’ organizations belonging to the APC have led successful campaigns in defending their right over productive resources and agroecological farming practices. These victories inspire us and enrich our experience in the fight for genuine agrarian reform and food sovereignty.”

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References:
Ms. Sarojeni Rengam (Executive Director, Pesticide Action Network Asia and the Pacific) – sarojeni.rengam@panap.net
Mr. Rahmat Ajiguna (Deputy Secretary General, Asian Peasant Coalition) – apcsecretariat@asianpeasant.org
Mr. P.P. Sivapragasam (Secretary General, CAWI) – secretariat@agriworkers.org