[E-rundbrief] Info 1424 - Rights to Water and Land - Declaration at WSF 2015

Matthias Reichl info at begegnungszentrum.at
Sa Apr 4 09:59:11 CEST 2015


E-Rundbrief - Info 1424 - Global Convergence of Land and Water 
Struggles: Rights to Water and Land, a Common Struggle - Dakar to 
Tunis: Declaration of the Global Convergence of Land and Water 
Struggles at World Social Forum Tunis 2015.

Bad Ischl, 4.4.2015

Begegnungszentrum für aktive Gewaltlosigkeit

www.begegnungszentrum.at

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Rights to Water and Land, a Common Struggle

Dakar to Tunis: Declaration of the Global Convergence of Land and 
Water Struggles

Tunis, 28 March 2015

Published on Saturday, 04 April 2015 13:27 by La Via Campesina

http://viacampesina.org/en/index.php/main-issues-mainmenu-27/agrarian-reform-mainmenu-36/1775-declaration-of-the-global-convergence-of-land-and-water-struggles

We, social movements, grassroots organizations and civil society 
organizations engaged in the defence of the rights to land and water, 
gathered in October 2014 in Dakar at the African Social Forum. We are 
fighting and protesting against natural resource grabbing, especially 
water and land grabbing of our Commons, and against the systematic 
violations of the associated human rights. Sharing our ideas led to 
acknowledgement of the essential linkage between our struggles, given 
the inextricable nature of land and water grabbing. We met again at 
the World Social Forum in Tunis in March 2015 to continue this 
dialogue with movements and organizations from all over the world in 
order to broaden this convergence.

To date, more than 200 million hectares of land have been grabbed 
globally by private firms, governments, elites and speculators, often 
with the support of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, 
the G8 and other institutions and consortiums. The minority's 
appropriation of our Commons leads to concentration, forced evictions 
and the oppression of peoples. This is implemented in the name of 
environmental protection, the prevention of climate change, the 
production of “clean” energy, mega-infrastructure projects and/or 
so-called development, often promoted by Public-Private partnerships, 
such as the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition in Africa. 
Entire areas and territories are thus dispossessed and local 
populations evicted, while the loss of identity and ecosystems makes 
life impossible! Communities whose rights and dignity have been abused 
find themselves with broken up families, or obliged to become 
refugees, forced to migrate, lose their rights, and are impoverished 
and starving. The access to and management of spaces of community life 
are destroyed by military and armed groups that perpetuate war and 
occupation, criminal State authorities, supported by economic, 
financial and political elites. This undermines local food systems and 
many local producers who feed the majority of the world’s population. 
When people resist they are criminalized, jailed and killed.

The huge profits of elites are thus built on the systematic violation 
of human rights of the majority of peasant farmers, informal 
settlement and slum dwellers, fisher folk, pastoralists, indigenous 
peoples and communities, nomads, rural and urban workers and 
consumers, especially youth and women, who are dispossessed of their 
land and livelihoods through violence, intimidation and torture. Land 
grabbing always goes hand-in-hand with water grabbing, and takes 
different forms: cases of unsustainable water-consuming farming, 
through the privatization and management of water utilities (stealing 
this vital resource from those who are unable to pay for it), 
contamination of aquifers caused by unregulated mining, the change of 
river courses and waterways through the construction of dams and the 
resulting eviction of communities, the militarization of access to 
water points, the dispossession of pastoralists and fisher communities 
of their livelihoods through practices such as coastal sand mining.

The criminalization of activists fighting for the protection of the 
Commons has become widespread, albeit hidden by the authorities. Land 
and water resources are increasingly scarce, and therefore critical to 
the security of societies and the sovereignty of States. However, the 
scarcity underpinning the water, land and food crises is not a given; 
it is a political, geo-strategic and financial construct.

In response to these threats to our lives and wellbeing, we are 
fighting back, asserting our rights and providing real solutions. We 
believe that peoples’ access to and control of land and water is 
essential to peace, to stopping climate change, as well as to 
fulfilling fundamental human rights and guaranteeing a dignified life 
for all. Equal distribution of land and water, and gender equality are 
central to our vision of food sovereignty, based on agroecology (as 
outlined in the Declaration of the International Forum for Agroecology 
in Nyéléni, in February 2015), local food systems, biodiversity, 
control of our seeds, and respect for natural water cycles. This 
vision applies to rural, urban and peri-urban populations and includes 
respectful producer - consumer relationships of mutual solidarity and 
cooperation.

Our solidarity, grounded in our commitment as activists, is built upon 
the following principles and convictions that unify our struggles:

1. That the human rights to water, food and land are fundamental, and 
crucial for life. All people, men, women, adults, children, rich, 
poor, rural and urban dwellers, are entitled to them.

2. That water and land are not only vital natural resources, but are 
also part of our common heritage, whose security and governance must 
be preserved by each community for the common good of our societies 
and the environment, now and for future generations.

3. Water, land and seeds are Commons, and not commodities.

4. We recognize that States are legally and constitutionally mandated 
to represent peoples' interests. States are therefore duty-bound to 
oppose any policy and international treaty that undermines human 
rights and their own sovereignty, such as Investor-State Dispute 
Settlement schemes as included in the Transatlantic Trade and 
Investment Partnership and the majority of investment treaties.

5. Land water management policies should promote the achievement of 
social justice, gender equality, public health and environmental justice.

6. We take a firm stand against foreign occupation and domination in 
all forms.

We therefore jointly with civil society organisations from around the 
world,

pledge to:

* Raise awareness, educate and organize communities in rural and urban 
areas in order to build a strong and united movement struggling for 
the recognition and enforcement of our human rights to food, water and 
land and territories

* Always defend the right of citizens and communities to free, prior 
and informed consent and full participation in the governance of 
natural resources in citizens’ legal institutions

* Build synergies between civil society actors across constituencies 
struggling against land and water grabbing in order to build national 
and regional platforms that support the building of an international 
convergence of land and water struggles

* Reclaim our lands, waters and seeds; reclaim the legitimate 
political spaces that we as rights-holders have fought for, such as 
the Committee on World Food Security and Nutrition; and oppose 
co-optation of our language in a way that supports false solutions 
such as “climate smart agriculture”

* Express our solidarity with and support for human rights defenders 
and those who resist land and water grabbing, especially when they are 
criminalized

* Oppose national policies and international treaties promoting the 
privatization and commodification of natural resources, as well as 
land and water grabbing, including prepaid meters, automatic tariff 
adjustments and the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between the 
EU and ACP countries, for both goods and services

* Denounce the World Bank’s “business” climate ranking and 
biodiversity offsetting systems, that are drafted solely to support 
speculation and foster land and water grabbing, while completely 
neglecting human rights and social and environmental standards.

We call on international governmental organizations, States and Local 
Authorities to:

* Recognize the indivisibility of human rights and their international 
obligations towards their realization, especially for vulnerable and 
marginalized groups, women and youth. They must systematically apply 
the human rights approach, stop violations and prevent and prosecute 
human rights abuses

* Implement adequate policies of agrarian reform, genuine land 
restitution, equitable redistribution and sustainable management of 
land, water and other natural resources

* Adopt coherent policies including on development that benefit 
communities' empowerment rather than economic and geopolitical interests

* Respect, protect and fulfil the human right to water and sanitation 
that was recognized and made explicit by the UN General Assembly 
resolution 69/2010, and adopt the constitutional and legislative 
regulatory frameworks that guarantee everyone the availability and 
accessibility of water and sanitation, as well as the effective 
justiciability of the human right to water

* Recognize, respect and protect the collective customary rights 
regulating the access, security and governance of land and water, our 
Commons, by ensuring women’s’ rights * Strictly uphold their 
obligations not to recognize illegal situations, including and 
especially prohibited acts by occupying powers, and not to cooperate 
or transact with any parties that engage in, or benefit from illegal 
situations

* Guarantee peoples' free, prior and informed consent and full 
participation when decisions are made about the management of land, 
water, and other natural resources. And not just hear us, but address 
our demands, including our right to say No to land and water grabbing

* Implement the International Labour Organization Convention 169 on 
the Rights of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples and the UN Declaration on 
the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

* Explicitly endorse the promotion of human rights, including the 
human rights to water, food and land, as part of the Sustainable 
Development Goals of the UN post-2015 Agenda

* Implement the CFS/FAO Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of 
Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests, and the FAO Guidelines for 
Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries immediately and with our 
full participation as rights holders; and enact national laws that 
make their provisions upholding peoples’ rights fully justiciable

* Support and adopt the UN Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and 
other People working in rural areas as currently being developed in 
the Human Rights Council

* Adopt and implement a Binding Treaty to prevent and prosecute crimes 
committed by transnational corporations and other business enterprises

* Adopt the relevant measures and instruments of international law, 
especially in the framework of the International Covenant on Economic, 
Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) of the United Nations, in order to 
effectively strengthen the human right to water and sanitation, and to 
clarify and specify its content and States' obligations, and to 
prevent any form of water grabbing

We call upon civil society, social movements, grassroots 
organizations, workers’ unions and NGOs of the world to engage in this 
discussion, to strengthen this declaration and support its claims by 
all available means. We need to foster the solidarity of our 
struggles, including the struggle for our rights to the essential 
resources required for life, we need to make civil society’s voice 
heard in the negotiations towards the adoption of the Sustainable 
Development Goals of the UN Agenda post-2015, in the application of 
international and regional guidelines on land and natural resources, 
and the COP 2015 in order to stop climate change.

As we continue to build this convergence, we recognize and appreciate 
our diversity, and welcome diverse initiatives that are emerging and 
which we will debate and discuss. To do this we commit to 
disseminating this declaration widely. We will take it to our 
territories and communities in order to involve them further in the 
process of shaping this Convergence.

Water and land: same plight same fight!

Tunis, 28 March 2015

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Matthias Reichl, Pressesprecher/ press speaker,
Begegnungszentrum fuer aktive Gewaltlosigkeit
Center for Encounter and active Non-Violence
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