Annette Aurélie Desmarais

Farmers, foodies and First Nations: getting to food sovereignty in Canada

This paper examines how the concept and framework of food sovereignty has been incorporated in food policy agendas across diverse sectors of Canadian society, particularly in the work and discourse of the National Farmers Union, Québecs Union Paysanne, Food Secure Canada and movements for Indigenous food sovereignty. This analysis highlights both the challenges to conceptualizing food sovereignty and the tensions in defining inclusive policies that engage with food sovereignty at distinct, and often overlapping, scales. We critically assess how the ‘unity in diversity’ principle of food sovereignty functions in the Canadian context, paying particular attention to the policy implications of debates about the meaning of food sovereignty. What is most evident in examining the demands of a wide range of actors using food sovereignty language in Canada is a shared aim to reclaim a public voice in shaping the food system and a growing convergence around ideals of social justice, environmental sustainability and diversity. But, if food sovereignty is about fundamental transformation of the food system, it is yet in initial stages in this country.

Voices From Maputo: La Vía Campesina’s Fifth International Conference

Abstract We are the men and women of the land. We are those who produce food for the world. We have the right to continue being peasants and family farmers, and to shoulder the responsibility of continuing to feed our peoples. We care for seeds, which are life, and for us the act of producing food is an act of love. Humanity depends on us, and we refuse to disappear. —“Declaration of Maputo: V International Conference of La Vía Campesina, October 19–22, 2008”