Events
For Immediate Release: GATES FOUNDATION INVESTS IN MONSANTO
[Please see fact sheet, background research and post-card text on Media Resources page of website here]
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 25th, 2010
Contact:
Travis English, AGRA Watch
(206) 335-4405
Brenda Biddle, The Evergreen State College & AGRA Watch
(360) 878-7833
http://www.seattleglobaljustice.org/agra-watch
GATES FOUNDATION INVESTS IN MONSANTO
Both will profit at expense of small-scale African farmers
Seattle, WA – Farmers and civil society organizations around the world are outraged by the recent discovery of further connections between the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and agribusiness titan Monsanto. Last week, a financial website published the Gates Foundation’s investment portfolio, including 500,000 shares of Monsanto stock with an estimated worth of $23.1 million purchased in the second quarter of 2010 (see the filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission). This marks a substantial increase from its previous holdings, valued at just over $360,000 (see the Foundation’s 2008 990 Form).
“The Foundation’s direct investment in Monsanto is problematic on two primary levels,” said Dr. Phil Bereano, University of Washington Professor Emeritus and recognized expert on genetic engineering. “First, Monsanto has a history of blatant disregard for the interests and well-being of small farmers around the world, as well as an appalling environmental track record. The strong connections to Monsanto cast serious doubt on the Foundation’s heavy funding of agricultural development in Africa and purported goal of alleviating poverty and hunger among small-scale farmers. Second, this investment represents an enormous conflict of interests.”
Monsanto has already negatively impacted agriculture in African countries. For example, in South Africa in 2009, Monsanto’s genetically modified maize failed to produce kernels and hundreds of farmers were devastated. According to Mariam Mayet, environmental attorney and director of the Africa Centre for Biosafety in Johannesburg, some farmers suffered up to an 80% crop failure. While Monsanto compensated the large-scale farmers to whom it directly sold the faulty product, it gave nothing to the small-scale farmers to whom it had handed out free sachets of seeds. “When the economic power of Gates is coupled with the irresponsibility of Monsanto, the outlook for African smallholders is not very promising,” said Mayet. Monsanto’s aggressive patenting practices have also monopolized control over seed in ways that deny farmers control over their own harvest, going so far as to sue—and bankrupt—farmers for “patent infringement.”
News of the Foundation’s recent Monsanto investment has confirmed the misgivings of many farmers and sustainable agriculture advocates in Africa, among them the Kenya Biodiversity Coalition, who commented, “We have long suspected that the founders of AGRA—the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation—had a long and more intimate affair with Monsanto.” Indeed, according to Travis English, researcher with AGRA Watch, “The Foundation’s ownership of Monsanto stock is emblematic of a deeper, more long-standing involvement with the corporation, particularly in Africa.” In 2008, AGRA Watch, a project of the Seattle-based organization Community Alliance for Global Justice, uncovered many linkages between the Foundation’s grantees and Monsanto. For example, some grantees (in particular about 70% of grantees in Kenya) of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)—considered by the Foundation to be its “African face”—work directly with Monsanto on agricultural development projects. Other prominent links include high-level Foundation staff members who were once senior officials for Monsanto, such as Rob Horsch, formerly Monsanto Vice President of International Development Partnerships and current Senior Program Officer of the Gates Agricultural Development Program.
Transnational corporations like Monsanto have been key collaborators with the Foundation and AGRA’s grantees in promoting the spread of industrial agriculture on the continent. This model of production relies on expensive inputs such as chemical fertilizers, genetically modified seeds, and herbicides. Though this package represents enticing market development opportunities for the private sector, many civil society organizations contend it will lead to further displacement of farmers from the land, an actual increase in hunger, and migration to already swollen cities unable to provide employment opportunities. In the words of a representative from the Kenya Biodiversity Coalition, “AGRA is poison for our farming systems and livelihoods. Under the philanthropic banner of greening agriculture, AGRA will eventually eat away what little is left of sustainable small-scale farming in Africa.”
A 2008 report initiated by the World Bank and the UN, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), promotes alternative solutions to the problems of hunger and poverty that emphasize their social and economic roots. The IAASTD concluded that small-scale agroecological farming is more suitable for the third world than the industrial agricultural model favored by Gates and Monsanto. In a summary of the key findings of IAASTD, the Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA) emphasizes the report’s warning that “continued reliance on simplistic technological fixes—including transgenic crops—will not reduce persistent hunger and poverty and could exacerbate environmental problems and worsen social inequity.” Furthermore, PANNA explains, “The Assessment’s 21 key findings suggest that small-scale agroecological farming may offer one of the best means to feed the hungry while protecting the planet.”
The Gates Foundation has been challenged in the past for its questionable investments; in 2007, the L.A. Times exposed the Foundation for investing in its own grantees and for its “holdings in many companies that have failed tests of social responsibility because of environmental lapses, employment discrimination, disregard for worker rights, or unethical practices.” The Times chastised the Foundation for what it called “blind-eye investing,” with at least 41% of its assets invested in “companies that countered the foundation’s charitable goals or socially-concerned philosophy.”
Although the Foundation announced it would reassess its practices, it decided to retain them. As reported by the L.A. Times, chief executive of the Foundation Patty Stonesifer defended their investments, stating, “It would be naïve…to think that changing the foundation’s investment policy could stop the human suffering blamed on the practices of companies in which it invests billions of dollars.” This decision is in direct contradiction to the Foundation’s official “Investment Philosophy”, which, according to its website, “defined areas in which the endowment will not invest, such as companies whose profit model is centrally tied to corporate activity that [Bill and Melinda] find egregious. This is why the endowment does not invest in tobacco stocks.”
More recently, the Foundation has come under fire in its own hometown. This week, 250 Seattle residents sent postcards expressing their concern that the Foundation’s approach to agricultural development, rather than reducing hunger as pledged, would instead “increase farmer debt, enrich agribusiness corporations like Monsanto and Syngenta, degrade the environment, and dispossess small farmers.” In addition to demanding that the Foundation instead fund “socially and ecologically appropriate practices determined locally by African farmers and scientists” and support African food sovereignty, they urged the Foundation to cut all ties to Monsanto and the biotechnology industry.
AGRA Watch, a program of Seattle-based Community Alliance for Global Justice, supports African initiatives and programs that foster farmers’ self-determination and food sovereignty. AGRA Watch also supports public engagement in fighting genetic engineering and exploitative agricultural policies, and demands transparency and accountability on the part of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and AGRA.
CAGJ-U.S. Social Forum Report-Back, Wed 8/25
CAGJ-U.S. Social Forum Report-Back
Wed August 25th, 6:30-9:00pm
Location: Hidmo Eritrean Restaurant (20th & Jackson in Central District, 2000 S. Jackson St.)
Six of CAGJ’s members who traveled to Detroit in June for the US Social Forum will share their experiences and highlight the critical national organizing strategies they encountered in areas of food justice, food sovereignty, media justice, immigration reform, global justice, and more! The group will share photos, provide a brief overview of the history and context of the Social Forums, and illuminate the significance of Detroit, Michigan as the setting for the second US Social Forum.
Our goal is to engage you to share your ideas for how we can harvest the fruit here in Seattle of the seeds that were planted through this momentous learning experience!
After the presentations participants will be invited to reflect on key questions in small groups, including:
*What does it mean to work for food sovereignty in our local community/context?
*How can we strengthen the links between our locally and globally focused organizing?
*What other steps can CAGJ take to become a more multicultural and multiracial organization?
Want to learn more about the US Social Forum? Read CAGJ’s blogs! Find them on our website here!
Farm Bill Workshop Word Cloud
This wordle cloud was created by all the participants of the August 8, 2010 Farm Bill Workshop!
Sunday 8/22 Teach Out! Laughing Crow Farm, Bainbridge
Teach Out! Engaging our Local Food Cycle
AN OPPORTUNITY TO LEARN ABOUT AND WORK FOR A LOCAL COMMUNITY FARM
Coordinated by the Food Justice Project of the Community Alliance for Global Justice
Laughing Crow Farm – Bainbridge Island, WA
Fourth Event of 2010! This Sunday, August 22nd, 10am-3pm, with potluck after!
CAGJ’s Food Justice Project invites our members and others to learn about and build connections with key players in the local food region through monthly visits to farms, community kitchens, and community gardens! The site visits include hands-on work that is needed by or is appropriate to the sites, opportunities to debrief and reflect at the end of the site visit, and calls to action! Each visit allows for carpool options and many – including the visit to Bainbridge! - feature a bike route guided by a CAGJ member. Through these visits, CAGJ hopes to facilitate a place for the voices of our local food producers to be heard and their knowledge and skills to be recognized and celebrated.
Laughing Crow Farm, one of the Day Road Farms on Bainbridge Island, is part of the island’s oldest working landscape and largest working farm. The land has been farmed since 1928, when it was cleared by the Suyematsu family. Today, it is among the sixty acres of public farmland managed by Friends of the Farm, a nonprofit that works to promote farming and farmland preservation on Bainbridge Island. The Day Road Farms also collaborate with Global Source Education to teach local students about sustainable agriculture. After visiting the farm, Teach Out participants are invited to a potluck on the South end of the island for food, fun, friends, and all the blackberries you can pick!
**Please note, space is limited, so RSVP’s are required. To sign up, fill out the online form here. If you have any questions, please email Molly at mollyjade@gmail.com. We will send you directions, instructions on the bike route, and carpooling details upon receiving your RSVP, as well as information about what to wear and bring. All activities will be appropriate for children and we can work out disability accommodations if needed.
Join the Food Fight! Farm Bill Workshop August 8!
Join the Food Fight!
Did you know that there is one federal bill that affects the food you eat, health, renewable energy, farms, the environment, the economy, immigration, and world hunger?
It’s called the Farm Bill. And together, we can make it work better for everyone!
The day after the SLEE dinner…..
Join us for a community Farm Bill Workshop
& Kick-off the formation of the Seattle Farm Bill Action Group!
Sunday August 8, 4-6:30 pm, potluck following
Workshop Description: Through interactive activities participants will learn about how the Farm Bill affects them personally and create a vision for the Farm Bill we want! Guest speakers Ben Burkett, Sue McGann and John Fawcett-Long will help participants understand the basics of the Farm Bill, its impacts on farmers, communities and consumers in WA state, and the struggles to improve the Farm Bill in 2008, including what lessons we can learn from these past efforts to be more effective in 2012.
About the speakers: Ben Burkett is a 4th generation Mississippi Farmer, President of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives and the National Family Farm Coalition, and involved in the international movement of farmers and farmworkers, La Via Campesina. CAGJ invited him to Seattle to give the keynote at our annual dinner on August 7, Strengthening Local Economies Everywhere. John Fawcett-Long has been a long-time advocate organizer for a sustainable and justice food and farming system. He was raised on a farm in southwestern Minnesota and moved to Seattle in the mid-80s. He has served as Director of the Western Sustainable Agriculture Working Group and on the Steering Committee of the National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture. He is a co-founder of the Washington Sustainable Food and Farming Network. John served as a key grassroots food and farming organizer in 1999 for the World Trade Organization protests in Seattle. Sue McGann is the Coordinator of Marra Farm, historic preserved farmland in South Park. A project of Lettuce Link – Solid Ground, Marra features a model urban community farm engaging people in sustainable agriculture and education while enhancing local food security. Sue coordinates the Giving Garden which generates tons of fresh, organic produce every year that is donated to a nearby food bank.
News
For Immediate Release: GATES FOUNDATION INVESTS IN MONSANTO
[Please see fact sheet, background research and post-card text on Media Resources page of website here]
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 25th, 2010
Contact:
Travis English, AGRA Watch
(206) 335-4405
Brenda Biddle, The Evergreen State College & AGRA Watch
(360) 878-7833
http://www.seattleglobaljustice.org/agra-watch
GATES FOUNDATION INVESTS IN MONSANTO
Both will profit at expense of small-scale African farmers
Seattle, WA – Farmers and civil society organizations around the world are outraged by the recent discovery of further connections between the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and agribusiness titan Monsanto. Last week, a financial website published the Gates Foundation’s investment portfolio, including 500,000 shares of Monsanto stock with an estimated worth of $23.1 million purchased in the second quarter of 2010 (see the filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission). This marks a substantial increase from its previous holdings, valued at just over $360,000 (see the Foundation’s 2008 990 Form).
“The Foundation’s direct investment in Monsanto is problematic on two primary levels,” said Dr. Phil Bereano, University of Washington Professor Emeritus and recognized expert on genetic engineering. “First, Monsanto has a history of blatant disregard for the interests and well-being of small farmers around the world, as well as an appalling environmental track record. The strong connections to Monsanto cast serious doubt on the Foundation’s heavy funding of agricultural development in Africa and purported goal of alleviating poverty and hunger among small-scale farmers. Second, this investment represents an enormous conflict of interests.”
Monsanto has already negatively impacted agriculture in African countries. For example, in South Africa in 2009, Monsanto’s genetically modified maize failed to produce kernels and hundreds of farmers were devastated. According to Mariam Mayet, environmental attorney and director of the Africa Centre for Biosafety in Johannesburg, some farmers suffered up to an 80% crop failure. While Monsanto compensated the large-scale farmers to whom it directly sold the faulty product, it gave nothing to the small-scale farmers to whom it had handed out free sachets of seeds. “When the economic power of Gates is coupled with the irresponsibility of Monsanto, the outlook for African smallholders is not very promising,” said Mayet. Monsanto’s aggressive patenting practices have also monopolized control over seed in ways that deny farmers control over their own harvest, going so far as to sue—and bankrupt—farmers for “patent infringement.”
News of the Foundation’s recent Monsanto investment has confirmed the misgivings of many farmers and sustainable agriculture advocates in Africa, among them the Kenya Biodiversity Coalition, who commented, “We have long suspected that the founders of AGRA—the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation—had a long and more intimate affair with Monsanto.” Indeed, according to Travis English, researcher with AGRA Watch, “The Foundation’s ownership of Monsanto stock is emblematic of a deeper, more long-standing involvement with the corporation, particularly in Africa.” In 2008, AGRA Watch, a project of the Seattle-based organization Community Alliance for Global Justice, uncovered many linkages between the Foundation’s grantees and Monsanto. For example, some grantees (in particular about 70% of grantees in Kenya) of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)—considered by the Foundation to be its “African face”—work directly with Monsanto on agricultural development projects. Other prominent links include high-level Foundation staff members who were once senior officials for Monsanto, such as Rob Horsch, formerly Monsanto Vice President of International Development Partnerships and current Senior Program Officer of the Gates Agricultural Development Program.
Transnational corporations like Monsanto have been key collaborators with the Foundation and AGRA’s grantees in promoting the spread of industrial agriculture on the continent. This model of production relies on expensive inputs such as chemical fertilizers, genetically modified seeds, and herbicides. Though this package represents enticing market development opportunities for the private sector, many civil society organizations contend it will lead to further displacement of farmers from the land, an actual increase in hunger, and migration to already swollen cities unable to provide employment opportunities. In the words of a representative from the Kenya Biodiversity Coalition, “AGRA is poison for our farming systems and livelihoods. Under the philanthropic banner of greening agriculture, AGRA will eventually eat away what little is left of sustainable small-scale farming in Africa.”
A 2008 report initiated by the World Bank and the UN, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), promotes alternative solutions to the problems of hunger and poverty that emphasize their social and economic roots. The IAASTD concluded that small-scale agroecological farming is more suitable for the third world than the industrial agricultural model favored by Gates and Monsanto. In a summary of the key findings of IAASTD, the Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA) emphasizes the report’s warning that “continued reliance on simplistic technological fixes—including transgenic crops—will not reduce persistent hunger and poverty and could exacerbate environmental problems and worsen social inequity.” Furthermore, PANNA explains, “The Assessment’s 21 key findings suggest that small-scale agroecological farming may offer one of the best means to feed the hungry while protecting the planet.”
The Gates Foundation has been challenged in the past for its questionable investments; in 2007, the L.A. Times exposed the Foundation for investing in its own grantees and for its “holdings in many companies that have failed tests of social responsibility because of environmental lapses, employment discrimination, disregard for worker rights, or unethical practices.” The Times chastised the Foundation for what it called “blind-eye investing,” with at least 41% of its assets invested in “companies that countered the foundation’s charitable goals or socially-concerned philosophy.”
Although the Foundation announced it would reassess its practices, it decided to retain them. As reported by the L.A. Times, chief executive of the Foundation Patty Stonesifer defended their investments, stating, “It would be naïve…to think that changing the foundation’s investment policy could stop the human suffering blamed on the practices of companies in which it invests billions of dollars.” This decision is in direct contradiction to the Foundation’s official “Investment Philosophy”, which, according to its website, “defined areas in which the endowment will not invest, such as companies whose profit model is centrally tied to corporate activity that [Bill and Melinda] find egregious. This is why the endowment does not invest in tobacco stocks.”
More recently, the Foundation has come under fire in its own hometown. This week, 250 Seattle residents sent postcards expressing their concern that the Foundation’s approach to agricultural development, rather than reducing hunger as pledged, would instead “increase farmer debt, enrich agribusiness corporations like Monsanto and Syngenta, degrade the environment, and dispossess small farmers.” In addition to demanding that the Foundation instead fund “socially and ecologically appropriate practices determined locally by African farmers and scientists” and support African food sovereignty, they urged the Foundation to cut all ties to Monsanto and the biotechnology industry.
AGRA Watch, a program of Seattle-based Community Alliance for Global Justice, supports African initiatives and programs that foster farmers’ self-determination and food sovereignty. AGRA Watch also supports public engagement in fighting genetic engineering and exploitative agricultural policies, and demands transparency and accountability on the part of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and AGRA.
CAGJ-U.S. Social Forum Report-Back, Wed 8/25
CAGJ-U.S. Social Forum Report-Back
Wed August 25th, 6:30-9:00pm
Location: Hidmo Eritrean Restaurant (20th & Jackson in Central District, 2000 S. Jackson St.)
Six of CAGJ’s members who traveled to Detroit in June for the US Social Forum will share their experiences and highlight the critical national organizing strategies they encountered in areas of food justice, food sovereignty, media justice, immigration reform, global justice, and more! The group will share photos, provide a brief overview of the history and context of the Social Forums, and illuminate the significance of Detroit, Michigan as the setting for the second US Social Forum.
Our goal is to engage you to share your ideas for how we can harvest the fruit here in Seattle of the seeds that were planted through this momentous learning experience!
After the presentations participants will be invited to reflect on key questions in small groups, including:
*What does it mean to work for food sovereignty in our local community/context?
*How can we strengthen the links between our locally and globally focused organizing?
*What other steps can CAGJ take to become a more multicultural and multiracial organization?
Want to learn more about the US Social Forum? Read CAGJ’s blogs! Find them on our website here!
Sunday 8/22 Teach Out! Laughing Crow Farm, Bainbridge
Teach Out! Engaging our Local Food Cycle
AN OPPORTUNITY TO LEARN ABOUT AND WORK FOR A LOCAL COMMUNITY FARM
Coordinated by the Food Justice Project of the Community Alliance for Global Justice
Laughing Crow Farm – Bainbridge Island, WA
Fourth Event of 2010! This Sunday, August 22nd, 10am-3pm, with potluck after!
CAGJ’s Food Justice Project invites our members and others to learn about and build connections with key players in the local food region through monthly visits to farms, community kitchens, and community gardens! The site visits include hands-on work that is needed by or is appropriate to the sites, opportunities to debrief and reflect at the end of the site visit, and calls to action! Each visit allows for carpool options and many – including the visit to Bainbridge! - feature a bike route guided by a CAGJ member. Through these visits, CAGJ hopes to facilitate a place for the voices of our local food producers to be heard and their knowledge and skills to be recognized and celebrated.
Laughing Crow Farm, one of the Day Road Farms on Bainbridge Island, is part of the island’s oldest working landscape and largest working farm. The land has been farmed since 1928, when it was cleared by the Suyematsu family. Today, it is among the sixty acres of public farmland managed by Friends of the Farm, a nonprofit that works to promote farming and farmland preservation on Bainbridge Island. The Day Road Farms also collaborate with Global Source Education to teach local students about sustainable agriculture. After visiting the farm, Teach Out participants are invited to a potluck on the South end of the island for food, fun, friends, and all the blackberries you can pick!
**Please note, space is limited, so RSVP’s are required. To sign up, fill out the online form here. If you have any questions, please email Molly at mollyjade@gmail.com. We will send you directions, instructions on the bike route, and carpooling details upon receiving your RSVP, as well as information about what to wear and bring. All activities will be appropriate for children and we can work out disability accommodations if needed.
Join the Food Fight! Farm Bill Workshop August 8!
Join the Food Fight!
Did you know that there is one federal bill that affects the food you eat, health, renewable energy, farms, the environment, the economy, immigration, and world hunger?
It’s called the Farm Bill. And together, we can make it work better for everyone!
The day after the SLEE dinner…..
Join us for a community Farm Bill Workshop
& Kick-off the formation of the Seattle Farm Bill Action Group!
Sunday August 8, 4-6:30 pm, potluck following
Workshop Description: Through interactive activities participants will learn about how the Farm Bill affects them personally and create a vision for the Farm Bill we want! Guest speakers Ben Burkett, Sue McGann and John Fawcett-Long will help participants understand the basics of the Farm Bill, its impacts on farmers, communities and consumers in WA state, and the struggles to improve the Farm Bill in 2008, including what lessons we can learn from these past efforts to be more effective in 2012.
About the speakers: Ben Burkett is a 4th generation Mississippi Farmer, President of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives and the National Family Farm Coalition, and involved in the international movement of farmers and farmworkers, La Via Campesina. CAGJ invited him to Seattle to give the keynote at our annual dinner on August 7, Strengthening Local Economies Everywhere. John Fawcett-Long has been a long-time advocate organizer for a sustainable and justice food and farming system. He was raised on a farm in southwestern Minnesota and moved to Seattle in the mid-80s. He has served as Director of the Western Sustainable Agriculture Working Group and on the Steering Committee of the National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture. He is a co-founder of the Washington Sustainable Food and Farming Network. John served as a key grassroots food and farming organizer in 1999 for the World Trade Organization protests in Seattle. Sue McGann is the Coordinator of Marra Farm, historic preserved farmland in South Park. A project of Lettuce Link – Solid Ground, Marra features a model urban community farm engaging people in sustainable agriculture and education while enhancing local food security. Sue coordinates the Giving Garden which generates tons of fresh, organic produce every year that is donated to a nearby food bank.
US Social Forum Food Sovereignty Declaration
CAGJ members participated in the US Peoples Movement Assembly (PMA) on Food Justice and Sovereignty at the US Social Forum that produced this statement, and we are excited to share it with you today! It includes the very exciting development of the new US Food Sovereignty Alliance ( a re-working of the former US Food Crisis Working Group)!
Please forward widely – and let’s make salt!
Heather Day
CAGJ Director
**********
Lovers of Justice, Sustainability and Dignity in the Agricultural and Food System (and the economy in general):
The June 22-26 US Social Forum was host to the first US Peoples Movement Assembly (PMA) on Food Justice and Sovereignty, which took place in the canopy village of the USSF in Detroit on June 23, despite weather forecasts of strong winds and hail. The People of the Land persevered and converged (about 150 strong representing probably 70 to 90 organizations across the U.S., rural and urban, grassroots and accompaniment NGOs, indigenous and non-indigenous, people of many colors and languages, elders and youth, to work out our common vision and shared lines of action we intend to take together. Below is the resolution/declaration with a list of actions we will be pursuing in the weeks, months and years to come. Also below that is the statement of the Indigenous Sovereignty Synthesis presented at the National PMA on Saturday, June 26, that holds particular resonance with the Food Sovereignty Declaration.) Out of this and other gatherings in Detroit, a new organization emerged, the US Food Sovereignty Alliance, that positions organizations part of this US based alliance to build a stronger U.S. counterpart than heretofore existed to the various Food Sovereignty alliances and movements across the planet. Representatives of Via Campesina North America, the Caribbean and International were present in the various meetings that moved this agenda forward in Detroit. (Via Campesina first popularized the concept of “food sovereignty” in their various struggles against international financial institutions, so-called “free” trade agreements and peoples gatherings in Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia…) People representing organizations or interesting in joining organizations, who are inspired by this declaration and this organizing effort, and would like to join forces with the process of building and strengthening the US Food Sovereignty Alliance, should contact myself (Stephen Bartlett, sbartlett@ag-missions.org and Tristan Quinn-Thibodeau, tristan@whyhunger.org ) to get in the (on-line listserve and/or other…) loop for future planning and organizing. As the Declaration states: The moment has come for lovers of food justice and sovereignty in the U.S. to “make salt.” Help us plan and implement the actions that will help us strengthen and unify our various efforts to “make salt” (fight impoverishment, cool the planet, preserve our “habitat”, the ecosphere). peace through active struggles for justice and freedom,
Stephen Bartlett
Agricultural Missions/ Sustainable Ag of Louisville (SAL, or “salt”)
US Food Sovereignty Alliance (formerly US Food Crisis Working Group)
***************************************************************
Statement from the People’s Movement Assembly on Food Sovereignty, US Social
Forum 2010 (more…)