Country: Colombia

Global land grab highlights growing inequality

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Massive tracts of land in the Global South are being bought up by international investors and ultra-rich corporations, fueling growing inequality – part of a wider global trend of wealth transfers away from the poor and working people.

The report from FIAN International and Focus on the Global South, Lords of the Land: Transnational Landowners, Inequality and the Case for Redistribution, puts the spotlight on the world’s ten largest transnational landowners – who together control 404,457 km², an area the size of Japan.

This is part of a global land rush. Since 2000, corporations and financial investors have acquired an estimated 65 million hectares of land – twice the size of Germany. Today, 70 percent of global farmland is controlled by the largest 1 percent of giant industrial-scale farms.

Forced displacements

This concentration has grave implications for food security, threatening the livelihoods of 2.5 billion smallholder farmers and 1.4 billion of the world’s poorest people, most of whom rely on agriculture for survival. It is also driving violence, forced evictions, and environmental destruction while also contributing significantly to climate change.

Virtually all the top global landowners named in the report have been implicated in reports of forced displacements, environmental destruction, and violence against communities.

One of the main players is the US pension fund TIAA, which has acquired 61,000 hectares in Brazil’s Cerrado region, one of the world’s most biodiverse areas. In the Cerrado, approximately half of the land has been converted into tree plantations, large agro-industrial monocultures, and pastures for cattle production — amid reports of violent land grabs, deforestation and environmental destruction which already shows signs of impacting the climate.

TIAA almost quadrupled its global landholdings between 2012 and 2023 — from 328,200 hectares to 1.2 million hectares.

Inequality

Land concentration undermines state sovereignty and peoples’ self-determination, with distant corporations controlling vast tracts of land across multiple jurisdictions.

The industrial-scale monocropping, often carried out on this land, is a major driver of climate change, biodiversity loss, and ecosystem destruction, preventing just transitions to more equitable and sustainable food systems and economic models.

These developments reflect a broader global trend of rising inequality and wealth concentration. Since the mid-1990s, the richest 1% of the world’s population has captured 38% of all additional accumulated wealth, while the poorest 50% have received only 2%.  An estimated 3.6 billion people, or 44% of the world population, now live on less than US$ 6.85 a day, below the threshold for a dignified life.

Because land grabbing is largely driven by global capital and the accumulation of land across jurisdictions by transnational corporations and financial entities, international cooperation is essential. The upcoming International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ICARRD+20) in Colombia early next year offers a critical opportunity for governments to agree on measures that end land grabbing, reverse land concentration, and ensure broad and sustainable distribution of natural resources.

In a world facing intersecting crises – from climate breakdown and food insecurity to entrenched poverty and social inequality – and amid reconfiguration of the global balance of power, now is the time to move away from neoliberal policies that have benefited very few, and to create a more just and sustainable global future for all.

Watch an expert panel discussion on the report here:

For more information or media interviews please contact Anisa Widyasari anisa@focusweb.org or Tom Sullivan sullivan@fian.org.

Carbon Markets undermine peasant autonomy and self-determination over Data

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The Colombian government aims to make the country a world leader in decarbonization. It has set ambitious targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and has introduced a carbon tax to discourage the use of fossil fuels. However, Colombia also promotes carbon markets, despite growing evidence of their uncertain climate benefits and negative impacts on the human rights of peasants, indigenous peoples, Afro-Colombian communities and other rural populations.

Asómbrate is one example of a carbon trading project that specifically targets small-scale farmers in Colombia. It promotes agroforestry as a “climate-smart” agricultural practice for coffee and cocoa production, promising participating farmers increased resilience and productivity, as well as additional income through the sale of carbon stored on their farms. The project is linked to a global carbon trading platform – ACORN (Agroforestry Carbon Extraction Units for Organic Nature Restoration) – created by Netherlands-based Rabobank and based on Microsoft's Azure cloud. ACORN’s explicit goal is to connect large companies with small farmers and enable the latter to participate in global carbon markets.

However, a new report from FIAN International and MAELA Colombia, Coffee and Carbon in Colombia – Human Rights Concerns at the Intersection of Food Systems, Climate Change and Data-Based Technologies shows that some of the peasants participating in the project are concerned about the lack of transparency around collection and use of personal and agricultural data. They also have concerns about the lack of independent complaint and accountability mechanisms, as well as reports of participating farmers changing farming practices in a way that could lead to negative environmental and climate impacts.

Based on research conducted by FIAN and MAELA, the report also points to human rights concerns linked to the vast amounts of data collected to enable carbon measurement and trading. These data are collected through technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), remote sensing and satellite imagery, and subsequently used to feed data analytics, algorithms and so-called Artificial Intelligence (AI). The range of data-based technologies that carbon markets rely on pose serious threats to communities' self-determination over data.

The report sounds the alarm on the specific human rights risks arising from carbon trading projects that directly involve small-scale food providers. It makes recommendations to the Colombian state, as well as to national, regional and international human rights institutions, to develop public policy frameworks that ensure respect, protection and fulfillment of the rights of current and future generations of peasants and other rural communities in the context of climate change policies, the transformation of food systems and digitalization. In Colombia, these issues must be duly taken into account in the implementation of a recent constitutional amendment that recognizes peasants as subjects of rights and special protection.

The authors also hope that the analysis contained in this report can contribute to the increased development and implementation of public policies that promote alternative, community-driven models for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, protecting and restoring ecosystems and biodiversity, and promoting sustainable and just food systems that do not result in the commodification and financialization of nature.

A response from Rabobank to a preliminary version of the report, sent to FIAN International on June 11, 2024, is available HERE.

A response from Solidaridad, ACORN/Asómbrate’s local partner in Colombia, to a preliminary version of the report, sent to FIAN International on June 13, 2024, is available HERE.

Download report: Coffee and Carbon in Colombia – Human Rights Concerns at the Intersection of Food Systems, Climate Change and Data-based Technologies

For more information or media interviews, please contact Tom Sullivan, FIAN Communications and Campaigns Coordinator sullivan@fian.org

Countries wage war and corporations profit: time for robust international treaty

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Last week, in response to a shocking armed attack by Hamas, Israel doubled down on its 16-year military closure and blockade of the Gaza Strip, halting humanitarian essentials including all food, water and fuel from reaching the population of 2.3 million. This decision, in violation of international humanitarian law, was taken by the Israeli state, but is being enforced with high-tech weapons supplied by corporations in the United States, Europe and Israel.

Despite a formal recognition in 2014 that companies have a responsibility to respect human rights, there is still no international legal framework binding them to do so. Next week, an  intergovernmental working group, mandated by the UN Human Rights Council, will reconvene in Geneva. It will be the ninth year of grinding talks toward a legally binding instrument to regulate activities of business enterprises, including transnational corporations, within international human rights law.

The problem of business impacts on human rights and the environment is nothing new. But recent trends – such as growing corporate influence over governments, corporate capture of international institutions and the expansion of extractivist economies – have amplified those impacts and urgently need to be addressed. Harmful effects are particularly intensified during conflicts, occupations, wars and other crises where the rule of law is already disrupted and business activities may end up fuelling or sustaining the turmoil.

Complicity in confict

Corporate and other private actors engage in business in conflict-affected areas for financial gain. But their involvement can also help maintain, worsen or prolong a conflict, prop up repressive regimes, or delegitimise sovereignty movements. Arms manufacturers, businesses operating in illegal settlements or purchasing raw materials from conflict zones and often those who merely continue business-as-usual are complicit in human rights and humanitarian law violations committed amid the conflict.

The activities of those businesses may impact food systems and food sovereignty by destroying agricultural and fisheries infrastructure, disrupting access to farmland and water, financing conflicts through crop trade or altering laws governing local food systems.

Beyond its military closure of Gaza, Israel has used its vast weapons arsenal, supplied by manufacturers including Lockheed Martin, Boeing and Elbit Systems – (which is in turn supported by UK-based Barclays bank –to launch five major military assaults on the narrow strip of land since 2008. According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), those attacks repeatedly targeted agricultural and fishery areas. Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, agricultural enterprises established in illegal Israeli settlements profit by using Palestinian land and resources to sell produce abroad.

Unfortunately, these companies are far from alone in supporting states that use food as a weapon of war or illegal occupation.

Since 2015, the Saudi- and UAE-led coalition fighting against Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen has intentionally and systematically attacked farmland, agricultural and irrigation infrastructure, mills, farm animals, markets and fishing ports. The weapons used to perpetrate these attacks were largely acquired from arms manufacturers based in several European countries, as well as Canada, Turkey and China.

In Western Sahara, Moroccan businesses illegally operate in agriculture and fisheries in the occupied territory. In 2019, €434 million worth of fish, tomatoes and melons were exported from the region to Europe. Although a European court repealed EU-Morocco trade and fisheries deals in 2021 – arguing that the agreement was made without the consent of the people of Western Sahara – Moroccan businesses continued to export mislabelled produce from the territory.

During its occupation of Iraq, US authorities implemented 100 orders that provided extensive economic advantages to US firms. Order 81, in spite of not being enforced, created new restrictions on plant varieties, banning Iraqi farmers from reusing seeds of new plant varieties and facilitating the establishment of a corporate-controlled seed market.

When coffee fuels conflict

In the Central African Republic, which has experienced an ongoing civil war since 2012, armed groups turn profits from trading in coffee, a lucrative commodity that plays a vital role in shaping conflict dynamics and the country’s  conflict economy. Similarly, the cocoa trade was used to fund armed conflict in Côte d'Ivoire during its five-year civil war between 2002 and 2007. Businesses trading in these goods help sustain the conflict resource economy by providing a no-questions-asked market.

During Colombia’s decades-long armed conflict, so-called death squads stole eight million hectares of land from small farmers, much of which was then illegally acquired by private firms. In 2016, a Colombian court ordered 19 companies, including several palm oil, banana and other agricultural companies, to return the stolen land. The multinational corporation Chiquita was also accused of financing the groups responsible for mass displacements and land grabs.

International humanitarian law (IHL) protects foodstuffs, agricultural areas (…) crops, livestock, drinking water installations and supplies and irrigation works from attacks, destruction or removal during conflict. Customary international law recognises “the right of peoples and nations to permanent sovereignty over their natural resources” as a basic component of the principle of territorial sovereignty and the right to self-determination. Yet, IHL is insufficient in regulating businesses in conflict, thus requiring a more robust legal framework that incorporates human rights concerns.

Human rights due diligence not enough

In its preamble, the most recent draft for a legally binding treaty on businesses and human rights released in July, stresses that “states must protect against human rights abuses by business enterprises and respect and ensure respect for IHL in all circumstances”. This key obligation, if enforced across the value chain, would require that so-called home states, where businesses are based, respect IHL and ensure that firms operating abroad also abide by IHL.

While this obligation in itself is positive, the language in the latest draft of the text remains vague about the measures states must undertake to ensure that business activities do not cause human rights abuse and violations in occupation and conflict situations.

The previous version of the treaty included a requirement to ensure enhanced human rights due diligence measures are adopted and implemented to prevent abuses in contexts of conflicts, occupations or wars. This could possibly include tying in a conflict analysis in their risk-assessment measures and developing an exit strategy to suspend or terminate operations if needed. This minimum requirement, however, has since been removed.

It is also crucial that the draft specifies that merely conducting enhanced human rights due diligence should not absolve corporations and natural persons from other forms of liability in the event that they participate in or contribute to worsening a conflict.

Given the heightened risk of business-related human rights abuses faced by people living in conflict-affected areas and occupied territories, it is imperative that international instruments that regulate business conduct ensure the highest standards of human rights protection.

As member states meet in Geneva next week for another round of negotiations, they must take seriously their responsibility to lay a solid foundation for the protection of human rights and the environment in these high-risk contexts.

Ayushi Kalyan is corporate accountability coordinator at FIAN International and works on the intersection of business and human rights issues, gender and conflict.

Heather Elaydi is a Palestinian-Canadian researcher and human rights advocate working on policy and politics around food, land and water, primarily in contexts of conflict and crisis in West Asia and North Africa.

This article was originally published in Geneva Solutions with the title “As countries wage war, corporations profit – time for robust international treaty” on October 19, 2023.

For more information or media interviews please contact Clara Roig Medina roig@fian.org or Tom Sullivan sullivan@fian.org

Cajamarca peasants continue struggle against South Africa mining giant

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The peasants have succeeded in suspending the mining operations temporarily, through a popular referendum, but the company still insists on laying siege to the territory. 

In 2023, AngloGold Ashanti relinquished two mining titles, which reduced the percentage of the concessioned territory but it still retains almost a fifth (17.9%) of the Cajamarca territory.  

Lawsuits filed by the company against the state in order to continue operating are still pending.  

In the UN's sights 

Grassroots organizations defending Cajamarca sent a letter to the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, who responded by contacting the Colombian State, to AngloGold Ashanti Colombia, to the State of South Africa and to AngloGold Ashanti South Africa.  

In these communications the special rapporteur asked for information from the states and the company on the La Colosa case and emphasized the importance of protecting human rights and the right to participation. These submissions were jointly endorsed by several other UN special rapporteurs.

Diverting attention

This year, AngloGold Ashanti announced that its headquarters will move from Johannesburg to London and that its main listing will move from Johannesburg to New York.  

By leaving South Africa all progress in the company's auditing in that territory would be put on hold, and it would have to start again from scratch in London, where the company would have a clean record.

In addition, Sara Moreno, from Centro Siembra, a social organization dedicated to the defense of this territory, explains that “with a primary listing in New York, AngloGold Ashanti is seeking access to the world's largest gold capital fund. While mining companies carry out these operations to continue strengthening their projects, there are no effective and binding measures to ensure that they protect human rights in the territories where they operate”. 

This case illustrates the urgent need for a UN binding treaty to hold transnational corporations to account. An effective UN binding treaty would help to protect people and the planet and focus on prevention, liability, access to remedy, international cooperation and implementation mechanisms, including in conflict affected areas thereby closing gaps in protection and regulation.

For more information or media interviews please contact Amanda Cordova Gonzales cordova-gonzales@fian.org or Clara Roig Medina roig@fian.org

Photo: Robinson Mejía

Cajamarca’s peasants seek UN support to defend livelihoods from massive mining project

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Cajamarca is considered to be Colombia’s “agricultural pantry” due to its longstanding prominence in the country’s agricultural production. It is farmed by peasant communities, often referred to as guardians of the Andean moorlands, which are critical to the water supply of several cities with millions of inhabitants.

Since 2007, efforts to install “La Colosa”, a large-scale open-pit gold mine operation (30 tons of gold expected per year) in the traditionally peasant dominated territory has threatened to irreversibly transform the economic, social, and cultural orientation of the region to the detriment of its people. The irrigation and water supplies of an estimated 2,400 families would be directly affected by the project.

                 

The La Colosa project triggered strong and organized opposition from the community. In 2017 local organizations successfully invoked a binding constitutional referendum mechanism (consulta popular), which resulted in a resounding “No” to the mine (97.92 % of votes). 

“We considered that with the consultation the government would be clear that in Cajamarca the mining project is not accepted, that we want to continue being peasants, we want to continue having the right to a dignified life, to a healthy environment, to our autonomy as peasants and rural communities”, says Robinson Mejia, from the Cajamarca y Anaime Enviromental Committee 

  

Since then, the company and the former Colombian government have actively sought to undermine the legitimacy of the referendum and the project by filing a series of lawsuits. The referendum only stopped the La Colosa project while the Ministry of Mines and Energy under the former government continued to grant a large number of other new mining titles in the area which y currently covers almost 30% of the territory.

 

 

Community seeking UN support 

Colombian land rights legislation distinguishes between the right to land, which can be private; and to the subsoil, which belongs to the state, even when the land is privately owned. This means that it can be granted to other private actors for exploitation; which directly impacts on local people’s right to food and food sovereignty. The referendum mechanism invoked by the community was an attempt to protect both land and subsoil and prevent a social, environmental, economic and cultural disaster.

“It is a total outrage to Colombian citizens, that the state has ignored all the rights established in the constitution to impose something that we do not agree with and do not accept in our territory. We are afraid and confused because in reality we do not know where this situation is going to lead us.” says Robinson Mejia, from the Cajamarca y Anaime Enviromental Committee 

The community and its allies demand that Colombian authorities adopt measures to ensure that mining decisions are not based on the so-called “energy mining potential” of the territories. They are seeking the support of the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food in raising these concerns with the Colombian government and AngloGold Ashanti, and insist on full consideration of the right to food, of peasant communities, and of participation in decision-making regarding economic investments and priorities in Cajamarca.

The communities also call on Colombian authorities to:

  • Seek legal ways to dismiss mining concession contracts and respect the referendum results, that established a prohibition on mining in Cajamarca. 

  • Adopt reparation measures for peasant communities affected by the exploration phase of the La Colosa mining project. 

  • Undertake legal reforms to harmonize mining, environmental and human rights legislation, and to detect and prevent impacts of mining projects in the exploration phase.

  • Actively support the process towards a treaty on TNCs and other businesses with respect to human rights, reflecting the demands of threatened and affected communities in the negotiations of the treaty and taking into account the lessons learned in the case of La Colosa

Some of these demands could be met under existing Colombian law but there is little access to justice for people affected by the activities of transnational corporations there where the controlling companies are based, or have their assets, as there is no binding global legal framework to regulate them.

               

“AngloGoldAshanti has sued the Colombian State in national courts, for having protected its citizens, the environment and water, prohibiting mining in moors. But the communities whose rights have been violated by this operation in Colombia have no way of claiming against the mine at the international level, or in their own country”, explained Viviana Tacha, lawyer at SIEMBRA, the Socio-legal Center for the Defense of the Territory. 

This case illustrates the urgent need for a UN binding treaty to hold transnational corporation to account in their home countries, in this case South Africa where AngloGold Ashanti has its headquarters. An effective UN binding treaty would protect people and the planet and focus on prevention, liability, access to remedy, international cooperation and implementation mechanisms, including in conflict affected areas thereby closing gaps in protection and regulation.

For more information contact Ana Maria Suarez-Franco: Suarez-Franco@fian.org<

Colombia : Unprecedented crackdown on protesters

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Colombian human rights organisations and members of the NGO-LAC Group in Geneva, joined by over 300 civil society organisations from around the world, call on the Human Rights Council, which is currently meeting in Geneva, to condemn the brutal repression and ask for an independent investigation. The joint declaration follows another globally supported call by human rights groups at the beginning of the ongoing Council session, urging the international community to act on Colombia.

“Police violence is not new in Colombia, as we saw in September 2020, when police tortured and killed a defenceless citizen, then killed another 13 in the following days”, said Ana María Rodríguez, deputy director of the Colombian Commission of Jurists (CCJ). “What is unprecedented is the scale of the crackdown and the sheer cruelty by law enforcement officials, including extrajudicial killings, torture, sexual assault, and the enforced disappearance of hundreds of peaceful protesters”, added Óscar Ramírez, lawyer of the Campaign Defender La Libertad: un asunto de todas.

From the start of the protests on April 28th to June 28th , 83 homicides have been reported, including at least 27 civilians killed by ordinary and riot police (ESMAD). A significant number of deaths have been attributed to armed civilians, often acting with the complicity of law enforcement officials. Eighty people have suffered eye injuries and another 114 gunshot wounds. Over 3,200 have been arbitrarily detained without basic procedural safeguards, exposing them to torture and other ill-treatment. Members of the mentioned Campaign speak of beatings, punching with blunt objects, electric shocks, threats of imminent execution, forced nudity, and sexual and gender-based violence, including rape. Many of these allegations are not being investigated and the involvement of the military justice system in criminal investigations and proceedings is equally concerning.   

The NGO-LAG Group in Geneva is composed of the following organisations: Centre for Civil and Political Rights (CCPR Centre), Dominicans for Justice and Peace, FIAN International, Franciscans International (FI), International Institute on Race, Equality and Human Rights (Race & Equality), International Service for Human Rights (ISHR), Peace Brigades International (PBI), Red Internacional de Derechos Humanos (RIDH), World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT).

Of particular concern is the practice of enforced disappearance, with detained people transferred to unauthorized places of detention, such as shopping malls, schools, and public transport stations, and held incommunicado for up to 36 hours. To date, 327 people are still unaccounted for, with the authorities denying that about half of these disappearances ever took place.

Attacks have particularly targeted groups in a situation of heightened vulnerability, such as indigenous people, members of the LGBTIQ community, as well as human rights defenders, journalists, and doctors treating injured protesters. Even a fact-finding mission by human rights groups accompanied by officials of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Colombia was threatened and shot at by police in Cali, on May 3rd.

Another dangerous practice is the indiscriminate use of “less-lethal” weapons, such as launchers of multiple projectiles located on tanks (Venom), which can in fact have lethal effects.

“The protest movement is rooted in poverty, extremely high levels of inequality, and systemic racism”, said Gerald Staberock, Secretary General of the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), which is a member of the NGO-LAC Group. “Instead of seeking a peaceful solution to the situation, the government has denied most of the abuse by law enforcement and focused on delegitimizing protesters, including by likening them to terrorists. This, together with the militarisation of the response and the involvement of armed civilians, reminds of the darkest hours of Colombia’s conflict.”

Over 300 human rights groups ask today States meeting at the United Nations Human Rights Council to call for an investigation and to urge the Colombian authorities to take the necessary measures to respect and guarantee the right to life and other basic human rights in the context of protests.

For more information, please contact:

In Geneva: Iolanda Jaquemet, Director of Communications, World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)

ij@omct.org, mobile +41 79 539 41 06

In Bogota: Paola Sánchez & Santiago Vargas, Comisión Colombiana de Juristas, mobile (+)57 321 8748251 santiagovargas@coljuristas.org paolasanchez@coljuristas.org

Human Rights Council urged to act on grave situation in Colombia

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Yesterday, June 22, 2021, during the 47th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, a group of more than 300 non-governmental human rights organizations, social movements and victims' associations presented a joint oral statement calling for action by the international community in response to the grave human rights violations committed in recent weeks in Colombia.

The organizations echoed the concerns expressed by the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mrs. Michelle Bachelet, on Monday, during the presentation of her annual report. The High Commissioner called for prompt, effective and independent investigations into the 56 deaths (54 of them civilians and 2 police officers) recorded by her Office in the context of the protests – that began on April 28, 2021 (National Strike) –  as well as the implementation of the Peace Agreement. The terms of the Peace Agreement are key to addressing the structural inequalities that have given rise to the protests and the State’s brutal response to them.

During the same interactive dialogue, the diplomatic missions of Belgium and Switzerland called for the respect of the right to freedom of assembly; expressed concern over the excessive use of force during the protests, and called for channels of dialogue to be set up.

In their statement to the Council, the non-governmental organisations highlighted a range of violations against those exercising their right to protest in Colombia, including killings, excessive use of force, acts constituting torture and other inhuman treatment, forced disappearances, sexual violence, arbitrary detentions and attacks, including cyber-attacks.

The organizations noted that these events which constitute flagrant violations of human rights,  have taken place despite both the ruling of the Supreme Court of Justice urging the Colombian security forces not to act in a violent, arbitrary and systematic manner during the demonstrations, and the calls of human rights mechanisms to cease these violations.

They also highlighted that the protests are linked to demands for human rights-related structural changes, including in regard to poverty (42% of Colombian society lives in poverty and 15% in extreme poverty), inequality, growing social injustices, impunity, systemic racism and systematic violence against human rights defenders, including social, peasant, union and indigenous leaders and the press, and the lack of full implementation of the 2016 Peace Agreement.

The organizations urged the Human Rights Council to demand that Colombia cease the use of violence and respect the right to peaceful protest; to carry out independent investigations of human rights violations committed in this context; to accept the visit of Special Procedures; and to facilitate the building of social consensus around structural demands.

Finally, they asked the High Commissioner, through the monitoring of her office in Colombia, to prepare a report on the human rights violations committed during the protests.

The joint declaration, which brought together various organizations from Colombia, Latin America and different countries of the world, was read before the Council by a representative of the Franciscan Family in Colombia.

Despite the fact that the relationship between the protests and the lack of effective implementation of the Havana Peace Accords has been constantly highlighted by Colombian social organizations, in its response to the High Commissioner, the Colombian State denied the link between the National Strike and the lack of implementation of the agreements. Once again the Colombian Government has ignored the demands of the sectors involved in the protests and downplayed the relevance of the implementation of internationally binding agreements.

Read the joint statement

Watch the oral submission

 

Solidarity with the people of Colombia – FIAN International condemns violent attacks on demonstrators

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The reported killings, forced disappearances, sexual violence, arbitrary detentions and attacks, including cyberattacks against the press and human rights organizations are deeply concerning.

On 5 May, when the call for a new day of peaceful protests was made to mobilise the Colombian population throughout the country and was once again cruelly repressed by the State, our national FIAN section in Colombia was victim of a cyber-attack that affected its website.

Behind these protests lie not only claims to scrap the proposed tax reform bill (withdrawn on 2 May) and a reform to privatize even more the health system, but broader human rights demands. Civil society has been denouncing the systematic impunity and violence targeting social, peasant, trade union and indigenous leaders defending human rights and calling for structural reforms, including the full implementation of the 2016 Peace Agreement.

FIAN International joins the many calls from the international community for the State of Colombia to immediately:

  • Cease the use of excessive and arbitrary force and respect the rights to freedom of assembly, freedom of expression and freedom of association. The censorship of messages denouncing the State should be immediately ceased;
  • Cease the militarization of cities and of civil protection which is against international human rights standards;
  • Cease all actions by military forces in articulation with armed civil actors, which attack protesters.
  • Stop all stigmatisation and targeting, as well as repressive actions, against indigenous populations mobilised in the protests.
  • Refrain from using the issue of food shortages to generate panic and justify actions that violate human rights.
  • Investigate all cases of excessive and arbitrary use of force and attacks to human rights defenders, including those prior to this year’s protests, by providing sufficient capacities to the National Human Rights Institution and Office of the Attorney General;
  • Enable the visit to Colombia of international independent human rights bodies to support with the monitoring and investigation of these cases;
  • Step up the implementation of all chapters of the 2016 Peace Agreement, especially chapter one on the Integral Rural Reform, in order to combat structural violence, inequalities and hunger and malnutrition.

Warning cry about the impact of agrotoxics in Latin America and the Caribbean

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Brasilia, Brazil. 28 April 2021. Yesterday, the Latin American sections of FIAN International presented the report Toxic Pesticides in Latin America: Violations of the Right to Adequate and Nutrition at a well-attended online event.

This 108-page publication features data and reports on the impacts of these toxic substances in eight countries across Latin America and the Caribbean: Brazil, Colombia, Paraguay, Ecuador, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, and Haiti.

The report documents how pesticides affect environmental health and that of humans' as well, as they hinder the full realization of the human right to adequate food and nutrition. It also identifies a widespread pattern in the business strategies of companies in the region which is based on corporate capture of public institutions and territories.

Over 700 participants attended the online release of this report. During the event, Juan Carlos Morales González, from FIAN Colombia, and researcher Leonardo Melgarejo presented the report’s main findings and conclusions. Affected communities in Brazil, Haiti and Paraguay shared their stories about the devastating and destructive effects pesticides have had on their livelihoods. Then, geographer Larissa Bombardi, author of Geography of the Use of Agrochemicals in Brazil and Connections with the European Union, and the UN Special Rapporteur for toxics and human rights, Marcos Orellana, analyzed the results of the report and presented their viewpoints. Rapporteur Orellana clarified:

 “The fact that certain types of pollution are legal does not justify violating human rights … dangerous substances must be eliminated”. He went on to underscore “[the] shared responsibilities of exporting and importing countries…nations’ obligations to prevent exposure to toxic substances are based on human rights”.

As follow-up on the work documented in this report, FIAN International will soon file a complaint with the relevant United Nations special rapporteurs regarding the Brazilian case presented during the online event, in which aerial fumigation was weaponized to evict rural workers from a disputed area in Pernambuco.

On May 5th, another online seminar will showcase this report before a global audience: during which FIAN International will explain the results of a study on the experiences of farmers transitioning towards pesticide-free communities and food systems.

Find out how the discussion unfolded and access the report in Portuguese, Spanish or English, and the executive summary in English

View another webinar  Poisoned Food, Poisoned ecosystems: how people are working towards pesticides free communities

For more information please contact: Ana María Suárez Franco Suarez-franco@fian.org

 

The strength of the struggles lies in unity

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With representatives from 23 organizations from 16 different countries, the members and supporters of the GNRtFN pointed with concern to the shrinking commitment by States and institutions to safeguard the right to food, as well as to the increasing corporate power over people’s diets and lives. As false solutions to hunger and malnutrition are on the rise, is in unity where the strength of the struggles lies.

Denouncing corporate influence

In a final declaration, the 30 participants denounced increasing corporate concentration and all forms of colonialism and occupation. In their view, these practices must be monitored and governments must use legal mechanisms to fulfill their human rights obligations, including their obligation to regulate business activities. “We are rights holders, not merely interested parties, and as such we demand an end to the impunity of those who violate human rights. The rights of people should come before the interests of corporations,” reads the declaration.

By the same token, procedures and techniques of multistakeholder platforms, like the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) initiative propose the involvement of food and related industries in programs and planning with no adequate conflict of interest safeguards.  Not only can this lead to detrimental consequences for people’s health but also to compromising human rights.

Malnutrition, food insecurity and hunger everywhere

From the refugee camps in Western Sahara and the mountains of Oaxaca, to the rural plains of the Mid-West in the United States and the barrios of Spanish cities, hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition persist. In other words, such predicaments are not limited geographically but manifest in various forms across the world. 

Currently, malnutrition and hunger are mostly being tackled through technical solutions, charity and food aid. This approach does not address the root causes of the problem but only temporarily relieves or covers up side-effects. The GNRtFN stressed that human rights are interdependent and indivisible and therefore the systemic violation of other rights, such as to land, water and other natural resources and livelihoods, to mention just a few, leads inevitably to communities going hungry and malnourished.

Deep-rooted patriarchy

Such indivisibility of rights is particularly relevant when it comes to women and girls. The network emphasized the obstacles women and girls face in each and every phase of their lives due to the persistence of patriarchal systems and approaches. “We are especially concerned that women, who are largely responsible for feeding the world, continue to live with violence, both physical and structural, having their rights continually violated in multiple forms simply because they are females”.

The network highlighted that the structural violence against women includes gender inequity: in order for them to fully and authentically participate in inclusive and democratic decision making, this must be overcome.  Gender-based discrimination is also applicable to traditional systems, which largely limit their access to and control over land, cattle and water.  “The organizations present here are strongly committed to this effort and to feminism as the necessary path to equity,” the network stated.

In the next months, the GNRtFN will continue deepening ties, exchanging experiences and working together towards the convergence of activities and advocacy endeavors. It will also strengthen its role in all global spaces and introduce the proposals of the declaration in national and regional workshops and meetings.

You can read the declaration here

For more information, please contact secretariat[at]righttofoodandnutrition.org