Africa/Global: Coalition Launches Global Call for Action

PRESS RELEASE

Jose Bove: + 33 607 363 035
Dennis Olson: + 1 612 203 5648
Alberto Ercílio Broch: + 55 (0)61 96 45 34 68

Coalition Launches Global Call for Action: governments must support
people's food sovereignty

São Paulo, 15 June 2004 * A coalition of non-governmental organizations
(NGOs), farmers associations and social movements from around the world
are using the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD
XI) as a platform for a Global Call to Action against "free trade"
agreements that destroy peasant based agriculture and lead to
corporate-controlled de-industrialisation in the South. This Global Call
to Action will take place during the week of 19-24 July, 2004; the week
immediately prior to the World Trade Organization (WTO) General Council
meeting in Geneva, Switzerland.

According to the Via Campesina Leader Jose Bove, governments should ban
any kind of public support used to export under the cost of production.
"Peasants must have the right to protect domestic food production
against low priced imports through the application of tariffs and import
quotas."

The coalition demands that governments develop frameworks that protect
local economies, small scale food producers and distribution systems. In
addition, agriculture must be discussed in a more appropriate forum than
the WTO.

UNCTAD was originally created to promote trade as an instrument for
development. "Since liberalization began, the experience of poor
countries has been that trade has actually strangled poverty reduction
and development, especially with agriculture," says Gopal KS of Center
for Environment Concerns, India. Gopal comes from the state of Andhra
Pradesh where four farmers commit suicide every day. Research has shown
that suicides indicate the complete loss of autonomy among the peasant
farmers.

"The WTO and the international trade agreements are not solving the
problems of the poor people, but they are protecting rich countries to
maintain high subsidies and a policy of intervention in other countries.
We expect that UNCTAD creates a new debate with a different focus. This
should be based on sustainable development, respect for the cultures of
all countries and food sovereignty," said Alberto Ercílio Broch,
deputy-director of CONTAG, the Brazilian National Confederation of
Agriculture Workers.

George Naylor, president of the National Family Farm Coalition of the
United States also agrees that farmers need policies that assure they
cover the costs of production. "At the international level, price
control and supply management mechanisms, as in the former UNCTAD
commodity agreements, must be reinstated."

The coalition calls upon organizations to demand that their governments
support:
- food sovereignty instead of export cash crops for international
trade.
- access for peasants and small farmers to productive resources.
- policies to stop overproduction and dumping.
- access to domestic markets for local peasant producers instead
of multinationals.
- peasant based production for domestic needs instead of subsidies
for export and dumping.