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25 January 2012 | Videos | Food Sovereignty
Land and Dignity
Members of the Commission of Land (UTAA) and the occupation of unproductive lands in Uruguay
Download: MP3 (738.5 kb)
Several representatives of the Commission of Land of Bella Union traveled to Uruguay’s capital, Montevideo in order to get support in a negotiation with the authorities of the National Institute of Colonization (INC) to finally have access to land for rural workers in that part of the country.
Juan Santana, Quique Machado, Daiana Díaz and Ana Laura Galván told us about the different actions in demand for land to cultivate sugar cane and for food production for their families. They demand the State’s intervention in the problem of food sovereignty.
On Friday 13 January, 50 rural families dedicated to sugar cane production occupied nearly 2,000 hectares of unproductive land in order to get a reaction from the Uruguayan authorities and social movements to find a solution to their demand for land.
Three days later the protest measure was lifted and the trade union leaders were sent to court. However, on Friday 27 January, the members of UTAA will meet with the authorities of the Institute of Colonization to submit a collective productive project that had been stalled for months.
In the interview they expose the effect of agrotoxics on workers, land grabbing by corporations and they reclaim international solidarity with peasant movements and rural landless workers in the region.
