Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Land For Those Who Work It
By Esther Vivas
Sunday, March 17, 2013
The land is a source of wealth for a few, here and on the other side of the planet. In the Spanish State, the housing boom has left a legacy of ruinous urban development, airports (almost) without airplanes, ghost towns, huge, obsolete infrastructure projects… And in the global South, the desire to profit from the land has driven off peasants and indigenous peoples, and imposed monocultures for export, large infrastructures for the exclusive benefit of capital and the plundering of their natural resources.
The oligarchy in power takes advantage and pulls the strings behind the scenes, negotiating shady urban development deals, redefining rural land to allow it to be used for construction. Corruption cases are multiplying. The culture of backhanders is the order of the day. So is a new despotism by big business at the expense of citizens and our territory. And elsewhere, history repeats itself. Corrupt governments are the best partner for investors who want to acquire land quickly and cheaply. According to an Oxfam report, every six days overseas investors sold an area equivalent to the size of the city of London. It is the fever of the land.
Privatization and land grabbing are the order of the day. What’s more beneficial than what we need to live and eat? The food and financial crisis, which erupted in 2008, gave rise, as has been well documented by the international organization GRAIN, to a new cycle of land grabbing on a global scale. Governments of countries dependent on food imports, in order to ensure the production of food beyond their borders for their own population, as well as agribusiness and investors (pension funds, banks), hungry for new and profitable investments, have acquired fertile lands in the South. It is a dynamic that threatens farming and food security in these countries.
Indigenous people, driven from their territories, are spearheading the fight against the privatization of the land. This is not a new struggle - and is one that was spearheaded by Chico Mendes, rubber tapper, known for his fight in defence of the Amazon and who was murdered in 1988 by Brazilian landowners. Chico Mendes helped create the Alliance of the Peoples of the Forest, comprising indigenous peoples, rubber tappers, environmentalists, farmers … against multinationals demanded logging and land reform with communal land ownership and its use for the benefit of farm worker families. As he said: “There is no defence of the forest without the defence of the people of the forest”.
The oligarchy in power takes advantage and pulls the strings behind the scenes, negotiating shady urban development deals, redefining rural land to allow it to be used for construction. Corruption cases are multiplying. The culture of backhanders is the order of the day. So is a new despotism by big business at the expense of citizens and our territory. And elsewhere, history repeats itself. Corrupt governments are the best partner for investors who want to acquire land quickly and cheaply. According to an Oxfam report, every six days overseas investors sold an area equivalent to the size of the city of London. It is the fever of the land.
Privatization and land grabbing are the order of the day. What’s more beneficial than what we need to live and eat? The food and financial crisis, which erupted in 2008, gave rise, as has been well documented by the international organization GRAIN, to a new cycle of land grabbing on a global scale. Governments of countries dependent on food imports, in order to ensure the production of food beyond their borders for their own population, as well as agribusiness and investors (pension funds, banks), hungry for new and profitable investments, have acquired fertile lands in the South. It is a dynamic that threatens farming and food security in these countries.
Indigenous people, driven from their territories, are spearheading the fight against the privatization of the land. This is not a new struggle - and is one that was spearheaded by Chico Mendes, rubber tapper, known for his fight in defence of the Amazon and who was murdered in 1988 by Brazilian landowners. Chico Mendes helped create the Alliance of the Peoples of the Forest, comprising indigenous peoples, rubber tappers, environmentalists, farmers … against multinationals demanded logging and land reform with communal land ownership and its use for the benefit of farm worker families. As he said: “There is no defence of the forest without the defence of the people of the forest”.
Full Article: http://www.zcommunications.org/land-for-those-who-work-it-by-esther-vivas
