agricultural workers and peasants

By Emile A. Frison - International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems - June 2016

Today’s food and farming systems have succeeded in supplying large volumes of foods to global markets, but are generating negative outcomes on multiple fronts: widespread degradation of land, water and ecosystems; high GHG emissions; biodiversity losses; persistent hunger and micro-nutrient deficiencies alongside the rapid rise of obesity and diet-related diseases; and livelihood stresses for farmers around the world.

Many of these problems are linked specifically to ‘industrial agriculture’: the input-intensive crop monocultures and industrial-scale feedlots that now dominate farming landscapes. The uniformity at the heart of these systems, and their reliance on chemical fertilizers, pesticides and preventive use of antibiotics, leads systematically to negative outcomes and vulnerabilities.

Industrial agriculture and the ‘industrial food systems’ that have developed around it are locked in place by a series of vicious cycles. For example, the way food systems are currently structured allows value to accrue to a limited number of actors, reinforcing their economic and political power, and thus their ability to influence the governance of food systems.

Tweaking practices can improve some of the specific outcomes of industrial agriculture, but will not provide long-term solutions to the multiple problems it generates.

What is required is a fundamentally different model of agriculture based on diversifying farms and farming landscapes, replacing chemical inputs, optimizing biodiversity and stimulating interactions between different species, as part of holistic strategies to build long-term fertility, healthy agro-ecosystems and secure livelihoods, i.e. ‘diversified agroecological systems’.

There is growing evidence that these systems keep carbon in the ground, support biodiversity, rebuild soil fertility and sustain yields over time, providing a basis for secure farm livelihoods.

Data shows that these systems can compete with industrial agriculture in terms of total outputs, performing particularly strongly under environmental stress, and delivering production increases in the places where additional food is desperately needed. Diversified agroecological systems can also pave the way for diverse diets and improved health.

Change is already happening. Industrial food systems are being challenged on multiple fronts, from new forms of cooperation and knowledge-creation to the development of new market relationships that bypass conventional retail circuits.

Political incentives must be shifted in order for these alternatives to emerge beyond the margins. A series of modest steps can collectively shift the centre of gravity in food systems.

Read the report (PDF).

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, May 31, 2016

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists:

Lead Stories:

• Niger Delta Avengers militants shut down Chevron oil facility - By Ruth Maclean, The Guardian, May 26, 2016; [related] Who are the Niger Delta Avengers? Deep Sea Divers, Sophisticated Explosives, and Sabotage - By staff, Earth First! Newswire, May 26, 2016; [and]: Local leaders supporting militants attacking Nigerian oil production - By Associated Press, FuelFix, May 27, 2016
• The Oil World in Chaos - By Michael Klare, Tom Dispatch, May 26, 2016
• American Unions Form Alliance to Prevent Climate Disaster and Promote Prosperity - By Joe Uehlein and Jeremy Brecher, Labor Network for Sustainability, May 24, 2016
• Leading US union SEIU makes fighting climate change a campaign priority - By Jana Kasperkevic and Oliver Milman, The Guardian, May 24, 2016
• Progressive Nonprofits That Oppose the New Overtime Rules for Low-Income Workers Are Hypocrites - By Ethan Miller, In These Times, May 23, 2016
• Why the Environmental Movement Is Not Winning - By Peter Montague, Huffington Post, (updated) May 23, 2016

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Convergence In Support of Eco-Prisoners & Against Toxic Prisons - June 11-13, 2016
• Flush the TPP - Ongoing through 2016 | #FlushtheTPP
• March for a Clean Energy Revolution - July 24, 2016, Philadelphia | #CleanEnergyMarch
• TWAC Cascadia 2016 - August 8th-15th 2016

The Thin Green Line:

• Dangling from a trestle, protesters provoke police - By Elizabeth Floyd Mair, Hudson Valley Earth First!, May 26, 2016
• Supporters of shipping coal through Oakland say it will bring jobs [in fact there will likely be more jobs if coal isn't shipped through Oakland; see No Coal in Oakland's analysis for details] - By Erin Baldassari, East Bay Times, May 24, 2016
• Fracking Comes to the UK for First Time in Five Years Despite Concerns Over Gas Leaks and Safety Breaches - By Victoria Seabrook, DeSmog UK, May 23, 2016 
  

Just Transition:

• Is the real rich v poor climate battle about to start? - By Ed King, Climate Change News, May 27, 2016
• Environmental groups should come to the aid of coal country - By Pete Maysmith, Grand Junction Sentinel, May 22, 2016
• Electrify the Rail System for a Just Transition From Fossil Fuels - By Patrick Mazza and Bill Moyer, Truthout, May 12, 2016

Bread and Roses:

• Food sovereignty and climate change - By La Via Campesina, Climate and Capitalism, May 28, 2016
• United Church of Christ, representing one million followers, endorses Wendy’s boycott! - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, May 27, 2016
• Insurgency, conflict and communalism in Colombia - By José Antonio Gutiérrez D. and Janet Biehl, ROARmag, May 26, 2016
• ZIMSOFF and Ucama farmers join hands to fight for farmer saved seeds - By staff, La Via Campesina, May 26, 2016
• “As people of faith… we pledge to join the boycott of Wendy’s until Wendy’s commits to justice for the workers that make your profits possible.” - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, May 25, 2016
• From the Green Revolution to GMOs: Living in the Shadow of Global Agribusiness - By Colin Todhunter, Counterpunch, May 25, 2016
• Kazakhstan: land protesters face police rampage - By Andrei Grishin, People and Nature, May 25, 2016
• Poultry Industry “Sustainability Workshop” Shuts Door to Farmers, Workers, Consumers, Animal Rights Groups - By Jean Willoughby, Rural Advancement Foundation International, May 25, 2016
• Publication: Farm Succession in Romania - By staff, La Via Campesina, May 25, 2016
• Revolt of the ‘Chapulines’: After Strike, Indigenous Mexican Farmworkers Vote To Unionize - By David Bacon, In These Times, May 25, 2016
• Bayer and Monsanto: A Marriage Made in Hell - By Martha Rosenberg and Ronnie Cummins, Organic Consumers Association, May 24, 2016; [related]: Bayer ‘Confident’ It Can Still Strike Deal with Monsanto, Merger Could Spell Disaster for Farmers and Global Food Supply - By Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch, May 26, 2016; [and] Small Farmers Are Foundation to Food Security, Not Corporations Like Monsanto - By Dr. Vandana Shiva, EcoWatch, May 23, 2016
• Bold, fruity, with a hint of RoundUp... - By Christian Kallen, Sonoma Index-Tribune, May 23, 2016
• Unions join the fight to ban glyphosate in the European Union - By staff, European Trade Union Institute, May 23, 2016
• Toxic ‘red tide’ in Chile prompts investigation of salmon farms - By Jonathan Franklin, The Guardian, May 17, 2016

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, May 25, 2016

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists:

Lead Stories:

• Breaking Free: A Rising Tide of Climate Resistance - By Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan, Common Dreams, May 19, 2016
• Explaining the Anthropocene: An interview with Ian Angus - By Socialist Review, Climate and Capitalism, May 18, 2016
• NUMSA statement on silicosis and Aurora judgements - By Irvin Jim, NUMSA, May 17, 2016
• The Hidden Workforce Expanding Tesla’s Factory - By Louis Hansen, San Jose Mercury News, May 15, 2016; [related]: The Slovenian Who Fell 3 Stories Illegally Working On Tesla Paint Shop, and Tesla’s Response - By James Ayre, Clean Technica, May 17, 2016; [and]: Tesla’s labor controversy shows that a green job isn’t always a good job - By Heather Smith, Grist, May 17, 2016
• Iron and Earth: oilsands workers call for training in renewable energy - By David Dodge and Dylan Thompson, Green Energy Futures, May 15, 2016

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Convergence In Support of Eco-Prisoners & Against Toxic Prisons - June 11-13, 2016
• Flush the TPP - Ongoing through 2016 | #FlushtheTPP
• March for a Clean Energy Revolution - July 24, 2016, Philadelphia | #CleanEnergyMarch
• TWAC Cascadia 2016 - August 8th-15th 2016

The Thin Green Line:

• Concerned Health Professionals Ireland call for frac ban - By Concerned Health Professionals of Ireland, Fracking Free Ireland, May 19, 2016 
  

Just Transition:

• #klimajobber: update on climate jobs in Norway - By Jonathan Neale, Global Climate Jobs, May 20, 2016
• Lançamento da campanha: Empregos para o Clima (Launch of climate jobs at 1 May in Portugal) - By Jonathan Neale, Global Climate Jobs, May 19, 2016
• Bay Area cities can lead the way to 100% clean energy - By Nathan Duran, Sierra Club Yodeler, May 18, 2016
• Film review: 'This Changes Everything' - By Rob Hopkins, Transition Network, May 18, 2016
• Some Say Alameda County's New Green Energy Plan Isn't Green Enough - By Jean Tepperman, East Bay Express, May 18, 2016
• Cracks in Capitalism, Part II: Publicly Owned Energy Comes to London - By Steve Rushton, Occupy.Com, May 16, 2016
• Americans Don’t Miss Manufacturing: They Miss Unions - By Ben Casselman, Five Thirty Eight, May 13, 2016
• From Coal To Code: A New Path For Laid-Off Miners In Kentucky - By Erica Peterson, NPR, May 6, 2016
• The energy fix - By Ruth Nyambura, New Internationalist, May 2016
• 100% Clean Energy Economy Is Much Closer Than You Think - By Marc Gunther, Sierra, May 2016

Bread and Roses:

• Activists, Farmers, Indigenous People Rise Up to March Against Monsanto - By Nika Knight, Common Dreams, May 21, 2016
• How Carbon Farming Can Reverse Climate Change - By Andrea Basche, EcoWatch, May 21, 2016
• Article 19-Right to Land and Other Natural Resources- absolutely unnegotiable - By David Jelinek, La Via Campesina, May 19, 2016
• Mobilisation Call: 2nd NYÉLÉNI Europe Forum For Food Sovereignty - By staff, La Via Campesina, May 19, 2016
• 1.4 million reasons why Publix should join the Fair Food Program… - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, May 19, 2016
• Chile’s ‘Worst Ever’ Red Tide Kills 20 Million Fish, Prompts Investigation of Salmon Farms - By Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch, May 18, 2016
• What is at stake in the negotiations for a peasant rights' declaration - By Vincent Delobel, La Via Campesina, May 18, 2016
• Blueberry farm workers are striking this morning in protest of wages - By Jeanne Pastore, Kern Golden Empire, May 17, 2016
• How corporate rights protections are threatening farmers' right to seed - By Lois Ross, Rabble.Ca, May 17, 2016
• Signed, sealed, delivered! 300+ Jewish leaders endorse Wendy’s boycott in stinging letter to Nelson Peltz… - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, May 17, 2016
• ECVC pushes for a united front in defense of Seeds - By staff, La Via Campesina, May 16, 2016
• MST Statement on the suspension of President Dilma Rousseff - By MST National Coordination, La Via Campesina, May 16, 2016
• Nebraska Farmers Sue Monsanto Alleging Roundup Gave Them Cancer - By Lorraine Chow, EcoWatch, May 16, 2016
• Via Campesina and allies in Geneva for next round negotiations on Peasant Rights - By Mohammed Ikhwan and Sandra Moreno Cadena, La Via Campesina, May 16, 2016
• Farmers sue Monsanto over alleged Roundup cancer link - By Nicholas Bergin, Lincoln Journal-Star, May 15, 2016
• Cuomo Decides To Support State Farmworkers After They Sue Him - By Scott Heins, Gothamist, May 11, 2016

By Jonathan Latham, PhD - The Ecologist, May 20, 2016

Piecemeal, and at long last, chemical manufacturers have begun removing the endocrine-disrupting plastic bisphenol-A (BPA) from products they sell.

Sunoco no longer sells BPA for products that might be used by children under three. France has a national ban on BPA food packaging. The EU has banned BPA from baby bottles.

These bans and associated product withdrawals are the result of epic scientific research and some intensive environmental campaigning. But in truth these restrictions are not victories for human health. Nor are they even losses for the chemical industry.

For one thing, the chemical industry now profits from selling premium-priced BPA-free products. These are usually made with the chemical substitute BPS, which current research suggests is even more of a health hazard than BPA. But since BPS is far less studied, it will likely take many years to build a sufficient case for a new ban.

But the true scandal of BPA is that such sagas have been repeated many times. Time and again, synthetic chemicals have been banned or withdrawn only to be replaced by others that are equally harmful, and sometimes are worse.

Neonicotinoids, which the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) credits with creating a global ecological catastrophe, are modern replacements for long-targeted organophosphate pesticides. Organophosphates had previously supplanted DDT and the other organochlorine pesticides from whose effects many bird species are only now recovering.

The same is likely to happen with glyphosate - whose authorisation the EU notably failed to renew yesterday. If the EU does ban the herbicide in the next few months, the most likely outcome by far is that farmers will reach for another bottle. They will only spray 2,4-D, dicamba and glufosinate (phosphinothricin) instead.

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, May 17, 2016

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists:

Lead Stories:

• LIVE BLOG: Climate Resistance Breaks Free from Fossil Fuels - By staff, Rising Tide North America, May 14, 2016; [related]: Climate Resistance Escalates Against the Fossil Fuel Empire - By staff, Rising Tide North America, May 14, 2016
• Break Free or Burn in Hell: a Message From the Canadian Tar Sands - By Paul Street, CounterPunch, May 9, 2016
• Exxon scrambles to contain climate crusade - By Andrew Restuccia and Elana Schor, Politico, May 9, 2016
• Is a Fear of Death at the Heart of Capitalism? - By James K. Rowe, The Arrow, April 28, 2016

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Convergence In Support of Eco-Prisoners & Against Toxic Prisons - June 11-13, 2016
• Flush the TPP - Ongoing through 2016 | #FlushtheTPP
• It’s Time For the Rubber Stamp Rebellion - May 15-22, 2016 | #NoNewPermits #NoPipelines #NoLNG
• March for a Clean Energy Revolution - July 24, 2016, Philadelphia | #CleanEnergyMarch
• TWAC Cascadia 2016 - August 8th-15th 2016

The Thin Green Line:

• Editorial: If coal is too dirty for the U.S., why would Oakland build a dock to export it to Asia? - By The Times Editorial Board, Los Angeles Times, May 9, 2016
• Demonstrators rally in South Philly against refinery expansion - By Dustin Slaughter, Billypenn, May 8, 2016 
  

Just Transition:

• Responding to economic critiques of the Leap Manifesto - By The Redeye Collective, Rabble.Ca, May 11, 2016
• World’s vulnerable must be at the heart of a low carbon transition - By Teresa Ribera and Michael Zammit Cutajar, Climate Change News, May 11, 2016
• Denmark Is Kicking Its Fossil Fuel Habit. Can the Rest of the World Follow? - By Phil McKenna, Inside Climate News, May 10, 2016
• Geothermal Could Put Thousands from Alberta’s Oil and Gas Sector Back to Work - By Carol Linnitt, DeSmog Canada, May 3, 2016

Bread and Roses:

• Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), representing millions, becomes the first major Christian denomination to endorse the Wendy’s boycott! - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, May 13, 2016; [related]: Official new Wendy’s Boycott website up and running, including a call for endorsements! - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, May 11, 2016
• Nebraska farmer leaders in Keystone XL battle call for 100% clean energy for all - By Mark Hefflinger, Bold Nebraska, May 12, 2016
• Day of Action in Support of Familias Unidas and San Quintin, MX Farmworkers - By staff, Boycott Sakuma Berries, May 11, 2016; [related]: Driscoll's Workers Call for Global Boycott over Alleged Abuses at World's Biggest Berry Distributor - By Amy Goodman, Democracy Now!, May 6, 2016
• Children in Farm Communities Pay a Steep Price for the Food We Eat - By Elizabeth Grossman, Civil Eats, May 10, 2016
• Brexit or Bremain: Collected Opinions and Resources - By Lynne Davis, Landworkers Alliance, May 9, 2016
• Vietnam police break up protest over fish deaths - By staff and wire, Al Jazeera, May 9, 2016
• Industry benefits but does not pay its dues; Patents are an assault on genetic resources - By Guy Kastler, Agricultures, May 6, 2016
• What Killed Jack McCall? A California Farmer Dies and a Case Against Monsanto Takes Root - By Carey Gillam, Huffington Post, May 6, 2016
• After a Century In Decline, Black Farmers Are Back And On the Rise - By Leah Penniman, Yes!, May 5, 2016

An Injury to One is an Injury to All:

• Federal Toxics Law Still Protecting the Chemical Industry’s Dirty Secrets - By Melanie Benesh, EcoWatch, May 13, 2016
• ‘Indescribable injustice’ - By Ken Ward Jr., Charleston Gazette-Mail, May 13, 2016
• Revision of European legislation on occupational cancers: only a small step forward - By staff, European Trade Union Institute, May 13, 2016
• Worker Killed at Exxon Refinery - By Meagan Parrish, Chem.Info, May 12, 2016
• Don't let the Fort Mac fire turn into feel-good boosterism for the extractive industry; They knew this was coming - By Nora Loreto and Sarah Beuhler, Rabble.Ca, May 9, 2016

Whistleblowers:

• Is the EPA Being Pressured? Environmental Concerns About Syngenta Chemical Removed From EPA Site - By Lisa Graves, PR Watch, May 11, 2016
• Whistleblower Fired for Exposing Flint Mayor’s Plan to Take Water Donations - By Llowell Williams, Care2, May 11, 2016

By Rory Smith - Truthout, May 7, 2016 ©Truthout; may not be reused without permission.

The food justice movement -- a loose but expansive conglomeration of organizations working to create a more just food system in the United States -- has accomplished a great deal over the last 30 years. But can it manage to converge in its diversity and create a countermovement potent enough to transform the current food regime? Or is it too shallow and too spread, destined to disappear in its disjointedness.

Things may seem a little out of sorts when one in six Americans -- residents of the most affluent country on the planet -- don't have enough to eat, and when the percentage of hungry people in the United States has gone up 57 percent since the late 1990s. Sprinkle in that little detail about how Black and Latino neighborhoods are often left practically devoid of fresh produce but flooded with fast food restaurants (something that contributes to high rates of obesity, diabetes and thyroid disease), and you might start to question one or two things.

Toss in the fact that many of the 2 million farm laborers who produce US consumers' fruits and vegetables are not only subjected to brutal labor conditions but also can't afford to consume the very same food they pick, and you might really start to wonder. And when you top off this gallimaufry with one more slight detail -- that there are 1 billion people around the world suffering from malnourishment, a number that hasn't changed significantly since the 1970s -- the inequity of the current food regime becomes pretty clear. It was the food justice movement that first recognized this reality, and it has spent the last 30 years challenging and redressing these inequalities.

The Black Panthers' Free Breakfast for School Children Program, Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers, and the family farming caucuses that swept the United States during the 1980s were early proponents of food justice. And while these original players have been all but subsumed by the passage of time, they have been replaced by hundreds of thousands of farmworkers, urban and rural farmers, activists, consumers and academics who are all working to institute a fairer and more just food system. This effort is what Eric Holt-Giménez, the executive director of Food First, calls "converging in our diversity," and it is the linchpin of creating a just food system: a system that stresses the right of communities everywhere to produce, distribute and have equal access to healthy food, irrespective of class, gender or ethnicity.

Just when that Rust Cohle-like pessimism seems to have obtruded on our collective consciousness -- foregrounded by our failure to engineer any overhaul of the US financial system and scientists' incredulous predictions on global warming -- the food justice movement could be that slow-cooked countermovement that we have all been waiting for. Everyone has some kind of a relationship with food. It is the cornerstone of culture and life, as well as of the capitalist system. If any revolution is going to be successful, this seems like a good place for it to start.

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, May 9, 2016

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists*:

Lead Stories:

• Major oil sands producers scale back output, shut down as wildfire rages - By Jeff Lewis and Shawn McCarthy, Toronto Globe and Mail, May 4, 2016; [related] Mass Evacuation as 'Apocalyptic' Inferno Engulfs Canadian Tar Sands City - By Deirdre Fulton, Common Dreams, May 4, 2016
• Break Free: Largest Civil Disobedience In Environmental Movement History - By Break Free Coalition, Popular Resistance, May 3, 2016
• 'Today Marks the End of TTIP': Greenpeace Leak Exposes Corporate Takeover - By Deirdre Fulton, Common Dreams, May 2, 2016
• How to Create an "Ecology of Change" by Combining Movement Uprisings With Long-Term Organizing - By Mark Karlin, Truthout, May 1, 2016
• The welfare of workers should be our primary concern… - By Gary Herman, Union Solidarity International, April 27, 2016

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Break Free 2016 - May 2016
• Convergence In Support of Eco-Prisoners & Against Toxic Prisons - June 11-13, 2016
• Flush the TPP - Ongoing through 2016 | #FlushtheTPP
• March for a Clean Energy Revolution - July 24, 2016, Philadelphia | #CleanEnergyMarch
• TWAC Cascadia 2016 - August 8th-15th 2016

The Thin Green Line:

• Legalizing Direct Action in Pennsylvania [video] - By Richard Mellor, Facts For Working People, May 7, 2016
• A Growing and WINNING Climate Movement - By Lena Moffitt, Sierra Club, May 2, 2016
• NUHW joins the No Coal In Oakland movement - By Staff, National Union of Healthcare Workers, April 18, 2016 
  

Just Transition:

• AGL: Energy transition can happen “almost overnight” - By Giles Parkinson, REnew Economy, May 5, 2016
• David Suzuki: Divest from Damage and Invest in a Healthier Future - By David Suzuki, DeSmog Blog, May 4, 2016
• Coalfield political theater masks path to progress - By Ken Ward Jr, Charleston Gazette-Mail, May 3, 2016
• May Day in Oslo - By Jonathan Neale, Global Climate Jobs, May 2, 2016
• Taking a bigger Leap when it comes to building green - By Matthew Adams and Melinda Zytaruk, Rabble.Ca, May 2, 2016
• Waste Done Right - By Ruth Tyson, Energy Justice Network, May 1, 2016
• We Are Mother Earth’s Red Line: Frontline Communities Lead The Climate Justice Fight Beyond The Paris Agreement - By It Takes Roots To Weather The Storm, The Leap, April 29, 2016
• World Tree to Reverse Climate Change through Earth-Repair - By Jordan Fink and Daniel Lerch, KBOO, March 23, 2016 

Bread and Roses:

• Boycott Supporters Speak Out for Food & Farmworkers Justice this May Day - By staff, Boycott Sakuma Berries, May 6, 2016
• Wendy’s Boycott actions heat up as Month of Outrage winds down! - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, May 6, 2016
• Environmental Disaster in Chile: Chiloe En Crisis - By Erin Gallagher, Revolution News, May 5, 2016; [relateed] Chile: Fisherman Barricade Chiloe Island; Protest Government Response to Red Tide Crisis - By Erin Gallagher, Revolution News, May 4, 2016
• Familias Unidas at May Day Events Throughout the State of Washington - By Staff, Boycott Sakuma Berries, May 5, 2016
• Intervention by La Via Campesina at the ‘30th FAO Regional Conference for Europe and Central Asia’, in Turkey - By Adnan Çobanoğlu, La Via Campesina, May 5, 2016
• Interview with Wendy Cruz on the challenges for the advance of Agrarian Reform - By Wendy Cruz, La Via Campesina, May 4, 2016
• 160+ Farm and Food Groups Ask Congress to Reject TPP, Stand Up for Independent Farmers and Ranchers - By staff, Global Justice Ecology Project, May 2, 2016
• The Little-Known Farmworkers Who Sparked the Biggest Labor Movement In U.S. History - By Alexa Strabuk, Yes!, May 1, 2016
• Trabajadores agrícolas en Bellingham (WA) llaman a boicotear Driscoll’s - By Por Niñx Salvaje, SubVersiones, April 29, 2016
• What’s a Carbon Farmer? How California Ranchers Use Dirt to Tackle Climate Change - By Sally Neas, Yes!, April 29, 2016
• Familias Unidas and Allies Keep Up the Pressure for Contract Negotiation with Sakuma Brothers Farms, Washington State - By Debi Covert-Bowlds, Farm Worker Ministry-Northwest, April 27, 2016
• Farm Workers Are Taking On Poor Pay And Conditions — And Winning - By Joseph Erbentraut, Huffington Post, April 27, 2016

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, May 3, 2016

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists*:

Lead Stories:

• Heatwaves will hit workers’ health in warming world, warns UN - By Arthur Neslen, Climate Change News, April 28, 2016
• Rail workers dispute lobby group’s take on Lac Mégantic disaster - By Grant Robertson, Toronto Globe and Mail, April 28, 2016; [related] As Lac-Mégantic proved, braking procedures matter - By Ron Kaminkow, Toronto Globe and Mail, April 28, 2016
• Fossil Capital: the rise of steam power and the roots of global warming - By Irma Allen, The Ecologist, April 27, 2016
• Loservilles and Ghost Dance - By George Wuerthner, Counterpunch, April 26, 2016
• Misunderstanding the Leap, critics fall flat - By Christopher Majka, Rabble.Ca, April 26, 2016

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Break Free 2016 - May 2016
• Convergence In Support of Eco-Prisoners & Against Toxic Prisons - June 11-13, 2016
• Flush the TPP - Ongoing through 2016 | #FlushtheTPP
• March for a Clean Energy Revolution - July 24, 2016, Philadelphia | #CleanEnergyMarch
• TWAC Cascadia 2016 - August 8th-15th 2016

The Thin Green Line:

• Northern Arizona U. Students Launch Sit-In as Fossil Fuel Divestment Movement Sweeps Country - Michaela Mujica-Steiner and Karina Gonzalez by Amy Goodman, Democracy Now, April 29, 2016
• Reclaim the power! Progress towards a fossil-free UK - By Guy Shrubsole, The Ecologist, April 29, 2016
  

Just Transition:

• Solidarity Sunday celebrates community resistance to opencast coal mining - By Staff, Reclaim the Power, May 1, 2016
• Devil capitalism sending us to hell - By Gary Engler, The New Commune-ist Manifesto, April 29, 2016
• USW response to 350.org’s ‘Break Free from Fossil Fuel’ actions targeting oil refineries - By Staff, United Steelworkers, April 26, 2016; [counterpoint] Can the Climate Movement Break Free From the 'Jobs vs. Environment' Debate? - By Kate Aronoff, Common Dreams, April 30, 2016; [related] Using the “Public Trust” to Frame “Break Free From Fossil Fuels” Actions - By Jeremy Brecher and David Solnit, Labor Network for Sustainability, April 29, 2016
• Benefits of Community Energy in Canada - By Elizabeth Perry, Work and Climate Change Report, April 24, 2016
• Demanding a Just Transition for Peabody Coal Workers - By Elizabeth Perry, Work and Climate Change Report, April 24, 2016
• Employment in Canadian Clean Tech and U.S. Clean Energy - By Elizabeth Perry, Work and Climate Change Report, April 24, 2016
• The Leap Manifesto is a path to jobs and justice - By Crystal Lameman, Toronto Globe and Mail, April 22, 2016
• Comment: Switched On London launch bid for new municipal energy company - By Archie Davies, Greenpeace Energy Desk, April 21, 2016
• As Oil Jobs Dry Up, Workers Turn to Solar Sector - By Lynn Cook, Wall Street Journal, April 21, 2016

Bread and Roses:

• March For Dignity International Workers Day - By staff, Boycott Sakuma Berries, April 28, 2016
• National boycott of Wendy’s spreads westward during Month of Outrage… - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, April 28, 2016
• Peasants in Asia give inputs to ‘UN Declaration on the Rights of Peasants & Other People Working in Rural Areas’ - By staff, La Via Campesina, April 28, 2016
• Migrant agricultural workers dreaming a better future - By Scott Neigh, Rabble.Ca, April 27, 2016
• Farm Defenders Occupy the Gill Tract Again to Halt Construction Indefinitely - By staff, Earth First! Newswire, April 26, 2016
• Back to the future: Wendy’s shows 20th century disdain for consumers’ intelligence with 21st century marketing push… - By staff, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, April 25, 2016
• Food Products Industry and their Supply Chains - By Elizabeth Perry, Work and Climate Change Report, April 25, 2016
• Student Activists Confront PepsiCo Executive on Conflict Palm Oil - By Jessica Serrante, The Understory, April 25, 2016