When Mohamed Aboutreika, a star soccer player for the Egyptian Al-Ahly Pharoahs, lifted his jersey following his team's victory in the African Nations Cup late last month, it wasn't just another sports stunt. Under his jersey was a T-shirt that read "Sympathize with Gaza." For a brief moment, people around the world were reminded, or even alerted to, the plight of residents in Israel-occupied Gaza. (See a photo of Aboutreika here.)
Beginning Thursday, Feb. 7, Israel will reduce supplies of electricity it sells to Gaza, as part of punitive measures taken against Gaza's civilian population, with the approval of Israel's Supreme Court. The cutbacks to electricity were permitted after Israel's Supreme Court last week rejected a petition by ten Israeli and Palestinian human rights organizations challenging Israel's planned reductions to the supplies of electricity and fuel it allows Gaza residents to purchase.
There is no doubt that Planet Earth is gravely ill due to the destructive actions of corporate and financial capitalist elites, responsible for global environmental destruction and climactic changes, as well as the privatization of all forms of life. We stand at a crossroads: we either change the paradigm of current civilization or human and planetary life will be destroyed.
The Organic Consumers Organization -- a major consumer safety organization and Grassroots International ally -- has issued a "Sustainability Alert" on the damaging underbelly of agrofuels.
Driving their tractors and greeting supporters along the way, a group of Mexican farmers recently traveled 1,200 miles over 14 days, protesting the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and demanding that the agricultural section of NAFTA be renegotiated.
Click here for a great photo of the over 200,000 strong march and an article in Spanish from La Jornada.
Organized by Heinrich Böll Foundation North America, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, Washington Office on Latin America, Alliance for Responsible Trade, Institute for Policy Studies, Labor Council for Latin American Advancement and Global Exchange.
Grassroots International is pleased to highlight "The Story of Stuff ," a newly-released, highly informative and entertaining Web video that documents the destructive impacts of consumerism and waste. The video features activist Annie Leonard taking viewers through the process of creating a consumer good - from the extraction of materials to the disposal. Check it out but beware: Your trash will never look the same.
This Saturday, January 26th is the World Social Forum Global Day of Action. Please join Mass Jobs with Justice in solidarity with the mission of the WSF for:
Colombia: Challenging Corporate Power and State Terror
11AM-1PM at the Community Church of Boston, 565 Boylston St, Boston MA.
Join Avi Chomsky, Orlando Acosta, Jeff Crosby and other organizers as they look at events in Colombia, free trade agreements, exploitation of natural resources, suppression of indigenous people, and targeting of workers.
Event to be followed by an action in solidarity with Colombia, marking the Global Day of Action.
It’s becoming apparent that climate change is negatively affecting farmers around the world. Erratic weather patterns force farmers to find new ways of growing crops, but sometimes people who work the land are helpless in the face of droughts or excessive rains. When farmers are unable to adapt to changes in climate, local food shortages affect whole communities.
A recent background paper by the Via Campesina summarizes how industrial-scale agriculture fuels climate change and thereby threatens small-scale farmers. But the paper also outlines how many farmers around the world are helping to slow climate change through the practice of sustainable grazing, the use of solar power, and other farm-based endeavors. You can read the background paper here.
Nusa Dua, Bali, 16 Dec (Martin Khor) -- The Bali Climate Change Conference concluded dramatically one day late on Saturday (15 December) afternoon after a dramatic day of events. The day (as the night before) was filled with the tension of deal making and deal breaking.
It saw tempers rising to boiling point, an accusation of mismanagement by the Secretariat that led to its top official taking leave temporarily in tears, a direct intervention of the UN Secretary-General and the Indonesian President to appeal to the countries to make a final deal, a seemingly recalcitrant United States holding the entire meeting to ransom, before several dramatic and angry appeals led finally to its announcement that it would "join the consensus."
Today, the news from Europe is setting a promise of what's to come in 2008 for food sovereignty and real, sustainable energy. We received a press release today from the La Via Campesina that a hunger strike led by Jose Bové and the 15 other anti-GMO campaigners that the French government has sided with them. They will ban the only genetically modified (GM) corn (MON 810) legalized in France.
Numerous partners of Grassroots International work daily to secure basic social and economic rights for Palestinians living in the Occupied Territories. Much of this work includes raising awareness of the appalling living conditions of ordinary Palestinians.
In a promising development for North American workers, U.S. Representative Marcy Kaptur, Democrat of Ohio, recently introduced legislation that would require the U.S. to renegotiate NAFTA. The goal of the legislation is to address the environmental harm, decrease in jobs and wages, and other social and economic problems caused by the failed trade agreement.
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) Accountability Act (H.R. 4329) would require the Executive Branch of the U.S. government to certify that certain benchmarks have been met by the U.S., Canada, and Mexico (the countries covered under the agreement). Such benchmarks include increased U.S. domestic manufacturing, stronger health and environmental standards, and the guarantee of Mexican democracy.
Grassroots International has been working with a group of organizations that first met together in Atlanta at the U.S. Social Forum in June 2007 to discuss what to do about biofuels and U.S. food and fuel policies. After much deliberation, these groups. including Grassroots, have formed a national coalition and are calling for an immediate moratorium on U.S. incentives for agrofuels, U.S. agroenergy monocultures and global trade in agrofuels.
The new magic bullet for our energy woes - industrial agrofuels - is already exacting heavy costs on food security and rural communities around the world. The anticipated increase in agrofuel production could lead to catastrophic impacts on the world's ability to feed itself.
In this report, Grassroots International, the Community Food Security Coalition, World Hunger Year, Food First and several other food justice organizations tackle these impacts and identify actions that would buffer communities from increased hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation.
The U.S. Senate ignored the wishes of 4 million Peruvian farmers and countless numbers of American family farmers, ranchers, and consumers earlier this month when it voted to create a new Peru Free Trade Agreement (Peru FTA). The agreement, modeled on failed free trade policies such as NAFTA and CAFTA, will allow American agribusinesses to dump tons of below-cost commodities such as corn and soybeans into the Peruvian economy, thereby creating unfair competition for Peruvian farmers. It will also allow Peru to flood the U.S. market with cheap fruits and vegetables at a time when American family farmers are trying to build sustainable food systems by offering affordable local produce to consumers.
Grassroots International was selected as a finalist for the MySpace Impact Awards. Grassroots is in the final 3, with the winner receiving a $10,000 donation and extensive promotion throughout the MySpace website. If you are a MySpace user, please vote for us right now, then each day until December 24th and forward this to others: http://www.myspace.com/impactawards.
Today marks the 59th anniversary of the International Human Rights day. It is the day the UN declared the issuance of the "International Declarations of Human Rights" to put new international foundations for enforcing and respecting the sacred life and dignity of human beings. It might be a co-incidence for the birth of this declaration with the anniversary of the Palestinian uprooting in 1948, still experienced by Palestinians up until today.
People are dying in Gaza. Patients die in their hospital beds because they are denied permits to access life-saving treatments abroad. Patients with such permits die at the Erez crossing because the Israeli military denies them exit, despite their permits.
These are all avoidable deaths. These are patients diagnosed with a critical condition, seeking life–saving treatment. This is tantamount to murder. Premeditated murder. More than 29 Palestinians have already died in this manner so far. A further 900 are still waiting to permits to leave the Strip.
Lecture: Agro-Energy and Its Impacts on the Food Sovereignty of Rural Communities in the Global South
Location
Brandeis University
Center of International Development
415 South Street
Waltham, MA 02454
This event is sponsored by The Heller School for Social Policy and Management.
