Grassroots International celebrates World Water Day and the efforts of small farmers, indigenous peoples and water rights activists worldwide.
In light of global water grabs, this year’s theme is quite ironic: water cooperation. Water is essential to life yet we are seeing communities being stripped of their water rights every day. From Brazil to Palestine to India to the US, water resources are being privatized and sold off to the highest bidder while communities are left thirsty and unable to maintain their crops. And governments, fueled by greed (or desperation), are failing to protect these vital resources.
Se Ra, Se Ta!-- Later is too late” was the resounding cry of people in Haiti on November 25, 2011, in the various actions held in honor of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. This affirmation also acknowledged that in the aftermath of the January 12, 2010 earthquake, the devastating effects of other forms of violence, such as crime, disease, economic and structural violence have been equally traumatic to the people of Haiti.
The Latin America Bureau (LAB) interviewed Grassroots’ partner, Rafael Alegría in Honduras. Co-coordinator for the Via Campesina-Central America, Rafael joins hundreds of other peasants in occupying land to call attention to the need for agrarian reform. Below is the interview, which also appeared on the Via Campesina website.
By the Via Campesina
Thousands of Honduran farm workers have launched a co-ordinated land occupation, squatting on some 12,000 hectares nationwide and fuelling new tensions over land rights, authorities said.
By Alicia Tozour and Mina Remy
Compared to their Arab neighbors, the occupied Palestinian territories are endowed with an abundance of freshwater. Despite this fact, Palestinians do not have access to enough water to meet their daily needs or support their small farms. Although Israel’s illegal expansion into the Palestinian territories is commonly viewed as a land grab, the placement of Israeli settlements and the construction of the Separation Wall is also a strategic water grab.
Our friends at Global Forest Coalition and Global Justice Ecology Project have produced a new video entitled A Darker Shade of Green: REDD Alert and the Future of Forests. The 28-minute video documents opposition around the globe to controversial programs that claim to Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) by putting forests into the carbon market.
By Alicia Tozour
Today, Grassroots International honors International Women’s Day by celebrating the ongoing victories of our partners, grantees and allies in their promotion of a global social movement for women’s rights and climate justice.
By Alicia Tozour
Over the last couple of days official Washington has been abuzz with what President Obama said, and didn't say, about the 1967 borders between Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. The president didn't say anything that hasn't been official U.S. policy under both Republican and Democratic administrations since at least President Carter's time. And, for good measure, nothing different than what the international community has been saying since even before then!
by Stephen R. Shalom
NOTE: the following is an excerpt from an article by Stephen R. Shalom, Jewish professor, writer, and advisory board member of the Israeli Occupation Archive. This article is a slightly edited and footnoted version of remarks delivered at New York University 28 Feb 2011 for Israel Apartheid Week
By Cloc/The Via Campesina
(Cancún, 5 December 2010) One idea dominated the opening and first working day of the global forum “For Life, Environmental and Social Justice”, organized by La Via Campesina and its allies at their camp in Cancún: we must foil the carbon markets and the REDD programme which governments intend to legitimize at COP16.
The below press release from Grassroots International's ally the Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN) discusses some of the events that were held on Indigenous Peoples' Day. IEN is a network of indigenous peoples who focus on creating sustainable livelihoods, demanding environmental justice, and maintaining indigenous traditions.
The UN’s special rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier de Schutter is interviewed on agro-ecology and other important food-related issues. Results of a recent Essex University study on yield and agro-ecology are highlighted.
With the support of Grassroots International, the Mexican Alliance for the Self-Determination of Peoples (AMAP) sent a small delegation of Indigenous representatives to the Peoples World Conference on Climate Change, held in Cochabamba, Bolivia from April 19-22, 2010. Below is an excerpt from AMAP’s report from the event:
Grassroots International recently joined a growing list of colleagues and food sovereignty activists who have signed an open letter to Oxfam America calling on the organization to take a stance to oppose biotechnology. The action comes following the recent release of a book detailing research commissioned by Oxfam.
Historian, activist, and Grassroots International friend Howard Zinn died January 27 at the age of 87. I remember introducing Grassroots International to Howard when I was Executive Director. He had heard of Grassroots, but he didn’t know much about it. I had just come back from the West Bank. I remember the moment when we bonded. I was trying to describe some indescribable injustice I had witnessed. Someone else who was part of the conversation asked me how I could do this work, wasn’t it just too depressing. I said, “No, it’s inspiring. What’s depressing is when people are oppressed and they can’t or won’t fight back.
The Haitian government has been largely silent since the January 12 earthquake. Publicly, that is. Who knows what officials are saying behind closed doors to international governments and other donors? Citizens don’t. They have heard from President René Préval about his personal losses from the quake – his shirts, his palace - but about little else, least of all about the substance of governmental plans for reconstruction.
This week – a full six weeks after the world-historic-level catastrophe – the Haitian government launched a post-disaster needs assessment (PDNA). The PDNA establishes working groups to assess damages and look at the macro-plan for reconstruction.
