SASAIMA DECLARATION

Following more than five decades of imposed implementation of the Green Revolution in Latin America poverty in the region has increased, as well as the rural exodus of peasants and indigenous people’s into the cities, the health problems resulting from continued exposure to the use of agrochemicals; soil degradation, water pollution, and genetic erosion mainly caused by the expansion of monocroping have also aggravated.

In face of this situation, as delegates of peasants’, African American, indigenous peoples’ and non-governmental organizations from Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, Brazil, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Cuba and Mexico, assembled in Sasaima, Colombia, September 14-17, 2001 to participate in the Latin American Regional Workshop ‘Cultivating Diversity’, we

DECLARE:

biopiracy and patenting of our produce and our knowledge are a threat to biological diversity and our cultural identities;
the growing influence of imported products in the domestic market is a threat to peasant family economies and farmers in general, and aggravates our dependence;
our opposition to public policies that promote the privatization, commodification and expropriation of the land and territories of indigenous peoples, African American and peasant communities in Latin America;
a demand that the seed breeding policies that pose a threat against local seed varieties be modified;
our opposition to GMOs, since they are a threat to our agriculture, our animals, our health and our environment;
that we strongly reject any food aid containing GE food;
that we are against the use of agrochemicals, whether they are banned or not;
that we say NO to big oil exploration and exploitation projects and other mega projects that destroy our ecosystems and threat our health and our ways of life; and

PROPOSE:

public policies that promote an agriecological development based on the respect for the customary traditions, the culture and the proposals of indigenous peoples’, African American and peasant communities as an agricultural model for Latin America;
that our peoples’ food sovereignty take precedence over any other public or private policies or actions;
appropriate support according to needs, and government recognition for the cultural and biological conservation activities undertaken by these communities, which benefit to a great extent the whole of the population;
that fair trade be promoted and that our own organic certification schemes be fostered and recognized nationally and internationally;
the effective implementation throughout the whole continent of ILO’s covenant 169, referring to the rights of indigenous peoples;
that agriculture be excluded from the remit of the WTO, and that the WTO stop having precedence over the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and other international agreements relating to human rights, health and the environment;
support for the initiatives that call for the removal of Article 27.3(b) of the TRIPS Agreement in the WTO, which requires patents on life, adding in this way our voice to the International Day of Action against TRIPS (Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights);
that the scope and content of the Farmers’ Rights clauses within FAO’s International Undertaking on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture be strengthened;
our support and involvement in the activities of the Network for a GMO-free Latin America;
support for Via Campesina’s call for the enactment of popular referendums and broad consultations with all the Latin American people and organizations, with regards to the participation of our countries in the FTAA (Free Trade Area of the Americas) and other regional and bilateral trade agreements.

Globalize knowledge, solidarity and struggle for a fair and healthy world, cultivating diversity!

Sasaima (Colombia), September 17, 2001


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