In a communiqué issued Wednesday, La Via Campesina stated that the proposals promoted around the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change show a lack of commitment by most governments, especially developed countries, to combat the climate crisis in a responsible way.

“The climate disaster will not be halted by the development of a new market for carbon and the invention of “rights to pollute”, by the expansion of genetically modified seeds designed to resist climate change, or by the development of industrial agrofuel plantations”, reads the statement.

“Only a radical change in production and consumption patterns will lead us to a more sustainable way of living. Via Campesina hopes that the Cochabamba gathering will draw the lines towards a resolute international policy towards climate justice.”

The international movement is celebrating the Day of Peasant Struggle on Saturday. In addition, they are calling several activities at the conference: “Land, Territory and Climate Change”, and “Sustainable agriculture cool downs the Earth”. Also, the farmers will participate actively in the official working group “Agriculture and Food Sovereignty”, created by the organizers of the conference.

Meanwhile, several movements, organizations and social networks – such as The Hemispheric Social Alliance, Friends of the Earth Latin America and the Caribbean, the Trade Union Confederation of the Americas, the Climate Justice Now Network, the Latin American Confederation of Farmers Associations, the World March of Women and La Via Campesina- that will be present in Cochabamba are calling a Social Movement Assembly, which will be held on Monday it that city. The aim of the Assembly is to discuss and organize support to proposals and initiatives by governments engaged with the rights of the peoples and nature. They will also discuss and organize the agenda of the social movements to promote alternatives to the expansion of market relations that consider nature as a simple resource, and also against the actions of transnational corporations and militarization.

“We, activists of many diverse social movements, characterize this current moment as one of arrogance and authoritarianism on the part of the United States, the European Union and transnational corporations. This was demonstrated in Copenhagen when very few countries tried to create an outcome that was in disagreement with the COP 15, and did nothing to stop global warming and the climate crisis”, they state in a communiqué.

They speak of a “civilization’s crisis of capitalism” and consider the logic of this economic system as racist and patriarchal, which “disguises the climate crisis in illegitimate negotiations”.

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