food sovereignty movement

By Morgan Ody and Beatrice Katzigazi - La Via Campesina, November 6, 2023

By staff - La Via Campesina, October 30, 2023

By staff - La Via Campesina, October 16, 2023

By Mamadou Goïta, et. al. - La Via Campesina, October 2023

African agriculture and food systems are evolving in an increasingly volatile context, impacted by climate change, conflicts, fragile and iniquitous globalised food systems, successive food crises, and unaddressed structural causes. Africa is one of the first victims of existing global inequalities, with a generally subordinate economic position, a limited voice in political decisions affecting the continent and its nations, and an extremely unequal distribution of the costs and benefits stemming from the exploitation of natural resources. In this context, the 2021 UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS), widely denounced by people’s movements around the world as undemocratic and illegitimate, sought to kickstart a global process towards “food system transformation” and urged countries to develop their own “national pathways” for achieving this goal. The Dakar 2 – ‘Feed Africa Summit’ in January 2023, sponsored by the African Development Bank, also enjoined countries to present “national compacts” emphasising private sector investment.

African governments are calling for an end to dependence on food imports. However, instead of supporting peasant agroecology and territorial markets, they often favour a “modernisation” approach, focusing on investment in specialised crops and zones, privileging privatised seeds and so-called modern technologies, relying heavily on foreign private investment and promoting export-oriented value chains. The national pathways designed by African governments within the framework of the UNFSS, like the national compacts presented at the Dakar 2 Summit, could further reinforce this trend. This is why African peasant’s organisations (POs) and civil society organisations (CSOs) have decided to conduct their own autonomous assessment of these developments.

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By Julie Snorek and Julie Davenson, et. al. - Food Solutions, August 14, 2023

From community work to state and federal level advocacy a Just Transition “focuses on the values, agency, relations and processes that underlie both structures and systems” and “create the capacities that empower individuals and communities to take action on their own behalf.”¹ A Just Transition puts governance, power, and democracy at the center and acknowledges that sustainability transitions, especially in agriculture, will only be addressed by shifts in political-economic power.

Domains of a Just Transition include access to natural ecosystems, knowledge, networks, systems of exchange, gender and equity.² When analyzing work toward a Just Transition, the question must be asked: Whose knowledge is considered valid, and is therefore enabled and valued, through contemporary modes of knowledge production and mobilization? The social dynamics of marginalization and inequality pose a major barrier to the development of sustainable food systems in this regard. When all types of knowledge are valued, including community, indigenous, and practitioner, then community voices are lifted up to create solutions for their own needs and overturn inequities across the food system.

Thus, the starting point is to expand networks through participatory governance to identify and respond to community needs and flex the “democracy muscle.” In other words, true change towards climate resilience through agriculture is only going to come when community leadership and decision-making at all levels of governance are understood and centered – a task that will require a wholesale mindset shift.

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By Zainal Arafin Fuad - La Via Campesina, July 6, 2023

By Ramona Dominiciou - La Via Campesina, July 6, 2023

By Jessie MacInnis - La Via Campesina, July 6, 2023

By David Otieno - La Via Campesina, July 6, 2023

By Pramesh Pokharel - La Via Campesina, April 17, 2023