La Via Campesina: Peasant-led agrarian reform and food sovereignty

Abstract

Faustino Torrez summarizes the findings of the Agrarian Reform Commission of La Via Campesina, an international peasant movement that initiated the Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform. The process included a global encounter with the landless peoples in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, the La Via Campesina conferences, and the global fora in Valencia and Porto Alegre. La Via Campesina has been developing a new concept of agrarian reform that recognizes the socio-environmental aspects of land, the sea and natural resources, in the context of food sovereignty. Integral agrarian reform encompasses policies of redistribution, just, equitable access and control of natural, social and productive resources (credit, appropriate technologies, health, education, social security etc.) by peasants and their families, indigenous people, landless workers, artisanal fisherfolk, pastoralists, the unemployed, Dalit communities, Afrodescendents and other rural peoples. He argues that development policies should be based on agro-ecological strategies centred on family and peasant agriculture and artisanal fishing; trade policies that oppose dumping of products in the market and favour peasant and family farm production oriented towards local, national and international markets; and public policies in the areas of education, health and infrastructure for the countryside that complement trade and other policies.