Call to participate in the "Land, Territory and Dignity" Forum
Call to participate in the "Land, Territory and Dignity" Forum
Social Movements/NGOs/CSOs parallel event to the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development(ICARRD)
Facilitated by the International NGO/CSO Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty (IPC)
Porto Alegre, March 6-9, 2006
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The Council of the FAO in its 128th session in June 2005 approved the proposal which called for an International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD) to be held in 2006. This constitutes a critical element of the FAO program to fulfil commitments of the 1996 World Food Summit, the 2001 World Food Summit: five years later, the World Summit on Sustainable Development and the Millenniums Development Goals (MDG). The FAO Council welcomed the proposal of the Government of Brazil to host the Conference that will take place in Porto Alegre from 7 - 10 March, 2006. The "International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development - new challenges and options for revitalizing rural communities" (ICARRD), will be the 2nd international conference on this subject, following the World Conference held in 1979 (http://www.icarrd.org/).
The International NGO/CSO Planning Committee on Food Sovereignty (IPC), which organized the NGO/CSO Forum on Food Sovereignty in Rome 2002, and which received the Forum's mandate to implement its Plan of Action that strongly requested to the FAO to support the realisation of "genuine agrarian and fisheries reform, rangeland and forestry reform, and achieve comprehensive and integral redistribution of productive resources in favour of the poor and the landless". The IPC has worked since then to make the voices of social movements and civil society organizations heard in international forums where issues related to Food Sovereignty are discussed, particularly in the FAO. Therefore, since the launching of ICARRD, the IPC was identified as the main facilitator for participation of social movements and civil society organizations in the Conference. The IPC will facilitate this task through the Forum "Land, Territory and Dignity", an independent and self-organized space aiming to debate and articulate processes and proposals as an input to the action of the social movements and to the Intergovernmental Conference.
What is IPC?
The International NGO/CSO Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty (IPC) is a global network of social movements and NGOs/CSOs concerned with food sovereignty issues and programmes. It includes social organizations representing peasants, small farmers, landless peasants, fisherfolks, Indigenous Peoples, agricultural workers and NGO networks with particular expertise and a long history of lobbying, action and advocacy on issues related to food sovereignty and agriculture. The IPC mechanism has an elected regional structure with regional focal points in South Asia, South East Asia, West & Central Asia and North Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, North America and Europe. For organizing the Forum, the IPC elected a political steering committee made up of representatives of social movements, and an operational committee with more technical staff.
Objectives of the Forum -
-Giving an expression to the real struggles of social movements for natural resources, land, water, seeds, fishing grounds, forests, as well as for an agroecological rural development.
-Presenting our proposals from the perspective of food sovereignty on issues related to Agrarian Reform and Rural Development.
-Making visible the repression and violence in the countryside and presenting strategies of resistance against criminalization of our struggles.
-Questioning the current development model.
Central Themes of the Forum
1. Principles and Recommendations for a Genuine, Integral and Original Agrarian Reform based on Food Sovereignty and Human Rights.
2. The Concepts of Land vs. Territory.
3. Strategies for Occupation, Recovery and/or Defense of Land, Territories, Forests, Fishing Grounds, Housing, etc.
4. Gender, Generations and Youth perspectives in the struggle for, and/or defense of, land, territory and natural resources.
5. Resistance to the dominant production and development model, agrobusiness and Privatization, the Silent Counter Reform in the Sea, Counter Agrarian Reforms and the Neoliberal Policies of Access to Land and Other Resources of the World Bank, Governments and Other Actors.
6. Resistance to Repression, Militarization, Military Occupation, "War on Terrorism", and Criminalization of social movements.
Working groups will be formed following these themes. Each working group will produce a summary of the current situation for their issues, a proposed plan of joint actions, and one or two paragraphs for a final declaration. Participants will work with a methodology based in a few plenary sessions to allow active participation in workshops on the central themes. Based on the conclusions of the workings groups a final declaration of the Forum will be drafted and then submitted to the Intergovernmental Conference.
Self-organized workshops:
On March 6 in the afternoon there will be the possibility to self-organize workshops which will run parallel to the Forum's working groups. The number of slots will depend on the number of rooms available at the venue. More information on how to register a self-organized workshop will follow.
Date and venue-
The Forum "Land, Territory and Dignity" will take place from 6 - 9 March in Porto Alegre/Brazil. The Forum will be held at PUC building facilities. Accommodation and local transport will be organized by IPC. Simultaneous translation into Spanish, English, Portuguese and French will be provided.
Funding-
FAO, IFAD, the Government of Brazil and other governments have committed themselves to secure the funds needed for financing a large number of delegates and carrying out the Forum in equal conditions as the intergovernmental conference. Organisations are also doing an effort on their own to ensure a maximum participation. Our objective is to bring together 400 delegates.
How to participate-
In order to guarantee a strong and balanced representation of different constituencies and regions in the Forum, the political steering committee agreed upon the following quotas
According to regions:
Asia 25%
Africa 20%
Latin America 30%
Europe 10%
North America 5% + 5 % Indigenous Peoples
WESCANA 5%
According to Constituencies:
Farmers and Landless: 60%
Indigenous Peoples: 15%
Fisherfolk: 15%
Agricultural workers: 5%
NGOs: 5%
According to Gender:
Women: 50%
Men: 50%
According to these quotas, the IPC Focal Points have been asked to prepare a list of participants from their regions and constituencies.
Self-financed participants-
A quota of 10% of the total number of participants financed by the Forum itself was fixed for self-financed participants. If the Forum has enough funds to invite 400 persons, for example, then 40 self-financed persons can join the Forum on their own. The purpose is to have participation that is representative and balanced based on geography and sector, and not based on who can afford to pay. Moreover, self-financed participants will be asked to finance on a one-to-one basis persons from the rural social movements organized in IPC. For example, if an NGO wants to bring 5 people to the Forum, they have to fund further 5 people chosen by IPC.
Self-financed participants have to send their request to participate to the IPC focal point in their region, with copy to IPC secretariat in Rome:
Please see the list of focal points attached.
IPC's guests
IPC will invite people from different sectors (NGO, academic, journalists, etc.) to join the Forum. The quota for guests is also 10% of the total number of participants financed by the Forum. Guests have to pay their costs on their own. The majority of these guests will be helping the Forum in tasks like translation, contact with press, facilitation and rapporteurs of working groups, etc.
For more information please contact the IPC focal point coordinating the participation process in your region.
Region/ constituency Name Organisation Address Country
International Secretariat Beatriz Gasco IPC Secretariat lo@foodsovereignty.org
Rome, Italy
International Secretariat Alessandra Covre IPC Secretariat tc@foodsovereignty.org
Rome, Italy
South East Asia Nathaniel Don E. Marquez ANGOC ndmangoc@philonline.com.ph
http://www.angoc.ngo.ph
Quezon City
Philippines
South East Asia Gilbert Sape PAN Asia 2
Pesticide Action Network Asia and the Pacific gilbert.sape@panap.net
http://www.panap.net
panap@panap.net
Penang Malaysia
South Asia Bipblab Halim IMSE
Institute For Motivating Self-Employment bipimse@cal.vsnl.net.in
http://www.indiamovement.org/NGOs/imse.html
India
South Asia Prem Dangal All Nepal Peasants Association, Madan Nagar anpa@mail.com.np
Kathmandu
Nepal
West & Central Asia and North Africa Maryam Rahmanian CENESTA maryam@cenesta.org
http://cenesta.org
Tehran, Iran
West & Central Asia and North Africa Razan Zuayter Arab Group for the Protection of Nature sanabel@go.com.jo
Amman, Jordan
West francophone Africa Ndiougou FALL ROPPA/Fongs
Fédération des ONG sénégalaises FONGS fongs@sentoo.sn
http://www.roppa-ao.org/
Thiès, Sénégal
Centre Africa Elisabeth Atangana Concertation Nationale des Org.ns Paysannes PROPAC focaob@hotmail.com
cnop-cam2001@yahoo.fr
Yaoundé, Cameroon
East Africa John Mutunga KNFAP
Kenya National Federation of Agricultural Producers mutunga@peasantsworldwide.net
Knfu@nbnet.co.ke
Nairobi, Kenya
West Anglophone Africa Olaseinde Makanjuola ARIGBEDE USMEFAN
Union of Small and Medium Scale Farmers of Nigeria arigbede@skannet.com
Nigeria
Latin America Mario Ahumada MAELA
Mov. Agroecológico de América Latina y Caribel maa@ctcreuna.cl
www.maela-net.org
Viña del Mar, Chile
Europe Daniel Van Der Steen Collectif de Stratégies Alimentaires daniel.vandersteen@csa-be.org
http://www.csa-be.org/
Belgium
North America Peter Rosset CECCAM-LRAN rosset@ceccam.org.mx
www.landaction.org
México
Indigenous Peoples / North America Saul Vicente IITC
International Indian Treaty Council binizaa2002@yahoo.com.mx
www.treatycouncil.org
Oaxaca, México
Fisherfolk Herman Kumara WFFP
World Forum of Fisher Peoples
General Secretary fishmove@slt.lk
Negombo, Sri Lanka
Fisherfolk / North America Pedro Avendaño Garcés WFF
World Forum of Fish Harvesters and Fishworkers
Executive Secretary info@foro-pescadores.com
Ottawa, CANADA