More than 400 participants gathered for the first European forum on Food Soverignty in Krems, Austria, from 16th to 21st August 2011.
For more informations, nyelenieurope.net
FOOD SOVEREIGNTY IN EUROPE NOW!
Food systems have been reduced to a model of industrialized agriculture controlled by a few transnational food corporations together with a small group of huge retailers. It is a model designed to generate profits, and therefore completely fails to meet its obligations. Instead of being dedicated to the production of food which is healthy, affordable and benefits people, it focuses increasingly on the production of raw materials such as agrofuels, animal feeds or commodity plantations. On the one hand, it has caused the enormous loss of agricultural holdings and the people who make their living from those holdings, while on the other hand it promotes a diet which is harmful to health and which contains insufficient fruit, vegetables and cereals.
This industrial model of production is dependent on finite fossil fuels and chemical inputs; does not recognize the limitations of resources such as land or water; is responsible for drastic losses of biodiversity and soil fertility; contributes to climate change; forces thousands of people into jobs without recognition of their most fundamental rights; and leads to the worsening of working conditions for farmers and workers, in particular migrants. It moves us further away from a respectful and sustainable relationship with nature. Exploiting and treating the earth in this way is the fundamental cause of rural poverty and hunger for more than a billion people in the world (such as now in the Horn of Africa). In addition, it causes forced migration, while creating a surplus of industrial foods, which end up being wasted or dumped in markets both within and outside Europe, destroying local production.
This situation is the result of food, financial, trade and energy policies, which our governments, the EU (especially through its Common Agricultural Policy), multilateral and financial institutions as well as transnational corporations have been imposing. Examples include the policies of deregulation and liberalization of agricultural markets and speculation on food.
As a consequence more than 400 people from 34 European countries from the Atlantic to the Urals and Caucasus, from the Arctic to the Mediterranean, as well as international representatives from diverse social movements and civil society organisations, met from the 16th to 21st of August in Krems, Austria to take a step forward in the development of a European movement for Food Sovereignty. We are building on the foundations of the Declaration of the Nyéléni 2007: Forum for Food Sovereignty, which reaffirmed the international framework for Food Sovereignty - the right of peoples to democratically define their own food and agricultural systems without harming other people or the environment.
Numerous experiences and practices already exist here and now, at local, regional and European levels, which are based on Food Sovereignty and which demonstrate how it can be applied.
We are people who share values based on human rights. We want free movement of people, and not free circulation of capital and merchandise which contributes to the destruction of livelihoods and therefore forces many to migrate. Our aim is cooperation and solidarity as opposed to competition. We commit to reclaiming our democracy: all people should be involved in all issues of public interest and public policy making, deciding collectively how we organize our food systems. This requires the construction of democratic systems and processes, free of violence, corporate influence, and based on equal rights and gender equality, which will also lead to the abolition of patriarchy.
We are convinced that Food Sovereignty is not only a step forward towards a change in our food and agricultural systems, but it is also a first step towards a broader change in our societies. For this we commit to struggle for:
Changing how food is produced and consumed
Changing how food is distributed
Valuing and improving work and social conditions in food and agriculture systems
Reclaiming the right to our Commons
Changing public policies governing our food and agricultural systems
We call upon the people and social movements in Europe to engage, together with us, in all our struggles to take control of our food systems and Build the Movement for Food Sovereignty in Europe NOW!
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