Deputy Minister of Rural Development of the Dominican Republic’s Ministry of Agriculture, Miriam Guzmán, linked this challenge to social peace in the region and around the world in a statement to Prensa Latina, one of the figures attending the two-day event.
In this sense, Guzmán praised these spaces for joint interventions with governments and organizations such as the United Nations International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), which, in addition to sharing experiences, make it possible to contribute to providing resources for progress to producer families.
For her part, Wendy Cruz, of the Vía Campesina Honduras chapter, explained that this type of exchange is called to defend rural families and artisanal fishermen who, in several countries in the region, are faced with public policies that keep them in total abandonment.
It is not fair that almost 80 percent of what we consume in the region are imported products, in contrast to high levels of poverty and malnutrition, in addition to a peasant and family agriculture in a precarious situation, which the governments of Dictatorships like those in Honduras have been abandoned today and tomorrow.
Cuban Adilen Roque, from the National Association of Small Farmers, also commented on the scope of the event, highlighting the opportunities to show other scenarios like that of her country, which already has a Food Sovereignty Law and more organized family farming with government support.
While Nicaraguan Fausto Torres, Latin American Coordinator of Rural Organizations and member of Via Campesina International, explained that this type of forum is held every two years and the choice of Panama as the venue will favor greater support for agricultural production and communities native, many of them sunk in poverty.
Torres specified that peasant agriculture itself is becoming more relevant than ever in terms of resilience to the onslaught of climate change, war conflicts or the Covid-19 pandemic and announced that the forum for the South American region will soon be held in Uruguay.
The recommendations and conclusions of this meeting in the Central American region, he specified, will be presented to the authorities and governments at the Global Campesino Forum, which will be held in Rome, Italy, in 2024.
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