[09/24/07] MST Informa #142: Once Again We Mobilize for Agrarian Reform

Dear Friends of the MST,

This week we in the MST are again embarking on a campaign for Agrarian Reform. We are carrying out occupations and marches in various states that are aimed at pressuring the state governments and the federal government to immediately carry out agrarian reform, which for some time has been bogged down in our country.

While the Federal government continues to prioritize investments in agribusiness -- R$ 58 billion in credit was freed up for agribusiness in the 2007/8 harvest and only R$ 12 billion for small farmers, around 150 thousand families remain camped under black plastic tarps alongside the highways throughout the country, waiting for a piece of land to plant and harvest. Without even mentioning the debt of the ruralists, currently at R$ 40 billion... Dear Friends of the MST,

This week we in the MST are again embarking on a campaign for Agrarian Reform. We are carrying out occupations and marches in various states that are aimed at pressuring the state governments and the federal government to immediately carry out agrarian reform, which for some time has been bogged down in our country.

While the Federal government continues to prioritize investments in agribusiness -- R$ 58 billion in credit was freed up for agribusiness in the 2007/8 harvest and only R$ 12 billion for small farmers, around 150 thousand families remain camped under black plastic tarps alongside the highways throughout the country, waiting for a piece of land to plant and harvest. Without even mentioning the debt of the ruralists, currently at R$ 40 billion.

The federal budget presented by the government for 2008, although it goes up 17% in relation to 2007, is strictly speaking almost equal to the R$ 3.8 billion approved in 2006, that is to say, there is no indication that it is a priority. For this reason, our demands are the same ones that we made to president Lula in April 2007:

  • We want Agrarian Reform! We want 140 thousand families who are now living camped along the highways to be in settlements;
  • We want the publication of the edict that brings the productivity indexes up to date;
  • We want a new program of rural credit for the settlement families, since the National Program for Strengthening Family Farming (PRONAF) reaches only 10% of those in settlements;
  • We want a program of farm industries for Agrarian Reform;
  • We want more expropriations;
  • We want to increase the funds for the National Supply Company (CONAB); its program for special anticipated purchases (only R$ 134 million) is totally insufficient
  • We want an increase in the funds for the National Education Program for Agrarian Reform (PRONERA), which has 99 approved courses but is without funding

Besides this, we want the federal government to stop including the projects of colonization in public lands of Amazônia in the Agrarian Reform statistics. These projects, besides not including the rural workers who are waiting to be in settlements, benefit only the wood-cutters of the region.

We fight for the end of the latifúndio. We want land in Brazil to be democratized. So we demand that the federal government issue a ruling that prevents foreign firms from buying lands in our country. We are fighting in defense of life and of biodiversity, since we know that monoculture increases poverty in the countryside, and compromises the land, water, and sovereignty of the country.

We also believe that Agrarian Reform consists of more than simply giving a piece of land to a rural worker. For this reason, our campaign also demands the implementation of infrastructure policies for the rural areas and credit for farm production. We want houses, technical assistance, education in the countryside and health care.

Along with 600 workers in São Paulo we occupied the headquarters of the National Institute for Colonization and Agrarian Reform (INCRA). Another 800 workers also protested in front of the State Secretary of Justice. We demand the settlement of the 3,000 families camped in São Paulo and we denounce the proposed law PL 578/2007 of Governor José Serra (PSDB) which would regularize the lands with falsified documentation in Pontal do Paranapanema (SP).

This morning (9/24) we also occupied the headquarters of INCRA in Belo Horizonte (MG), in Chapecó (SC), in São Luiz (MA), in Fortaleza (CE), the headquarters of the Treasury Ministry, in Cuiabá (MT), the Federal Revenue building in Goiânia (GO), besides the protests in Rio Grande do Sul and in Rio de Janeiro. We want to pressure the public agencies to speed up the process of expropriation of Agrarian Reform properties.

In Rio Grande do Sul, three separate marches went through a large part of the state last week to denounce the expropriation of lands in that state by transnational companies for the planting of eucalyptus and the indifference of the government of Yeda Crusius (PSDB) in relation to Agrarian Reform. The governor dismissed the Agrarian Reform cabinet and now the state has no agency responsible for that issue. The farm policy of the Yeda government consists in repressing the social movements and in unrestrained support for agribusiness.

The marchers are passing through strategic points in the three regions of the state, with protests and occupation in the headquarters of public agencies. On Sunday the 9th, the march that is going through Pelotas carried out a protest in front of the nursery of saplings belonging to Votorantim Celulose, in Capão do Leão. And neither the threats of the big latifundio owners against our marchers in Bagé or the calling out of the Military Brigade frightened our activists, who are ready to continue the struggle for a more just and egalitarian Brazil. The three marches continue in the direction of the Coqueiros Farm (owned by the Guerra family), in Coqueiros do Sul, an area of more than 10 thousand hectares that should be destined for Agrarian Reform.

Throughout this week, other occupations and protests are going on in various states. We are committed to the struggle of millions of Brazilians who seek better living standards. For this reason, we are struggling for access to land and for the distribution of the country’s wealth. We are committed to the struggle against agribusiness, against the monoculture of sugar cane, of eucalyptus and pine. We are struggling to strengthen family farms, for food sovereignty in our country, for biodiversity. For all this we are once again mobilizing to demand the settlement of all the families in encampments throughout Brazil.

Greetings!

National Leadership of the MST