We express our solidarity with the Iranian people and the world in denouncing the escalating US aggression against Iran and in the whole of West Asia. We issue these calls in support of the global call to stop the US war on Iran, a step forward toward achieving a just and lasting peace in West Asia.
Participants closed the meeting with high spirits, committing to advance people’s food sovereignty in WANA through the strengthening of the platform.
The People’s Coalition on Food Sovereignty (PCFS) hosted a learning exchange program (LEP) in the Philippines in October to November 2019. For more than two weeks, representatives of the Coalition of Cambodian Farmer Communities (CCFC), Cambodia Youth Network (CYN), and Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT) met with people’s organizations in the Philippines for the sharing of good practices and experiences in organizing and the strengthening of their respective organizations as a social movement. They also visited two rural communities where they saw firsthand how Filipino peasant organizations claim and practice people’s food sovereignty amid poverty, landgrabbing, and repression.
GM crops like Golden Rice will never be the answer to hunger and malnutrition in the Philippines and in any other country. Governments should first tackle the widespread landlessness and poverty in rural areas. Policies should gear toward strengthening domestic agriculture empowering local farmers, who can produce more than enough of the many vitamin-enriched crops that are cheaper than Golden Rice. In this regard, the Rice Tarrification Law should be revoked in the Philippines to alleviate the situation of local rice farmers.
While the UNDROP is a landmark declaration despite its limitations, there are key issues it failed to address.
We invite everyone to join the Global Day of Action on December 10, International Human Rights Day. Let us call for our legitimate demands including people’s food sovereignty, defend our rights, and express our denunciation of neoliberal globalization and fascism.