Towards a European Forum for Food Sovereignty

Recognising the harmful effects of corporate-driven globalisation of agri-food systems, Food Sovereignty Movement was initiated in order to defend local, small-scale food systems by strong alliances of social movements active in the food and agricultural domain.
The first European Food Sovereignty Forum will be held from August 16th to 21st 2011 in Krems, Austria. This Forum is the next step in the process to bring actors working for Food Sovereignty together. At the first Food Sovereignty Forum, the Nyeleni Forum in 2007, 500 Delegates from all over the World met in Selingué, Mali to build a worldwide movement for Food Sovereignty (Nyeleni was a famous Malian peasant woman who provided food for her community).

In this summer, at the Nyeleni Europe Forum the key goals are to strengthen, broaden and build a movement for Food Sovereignty in Europe by reinforcing the common understanding of what Food Sovereignty means and constructing common strategies to make Food Sovereignty a reality in Europe.

In order to unite the forces of the international Food Sovereignty movements this Forum struggles for reclaiming the autonomy and control of local communities, individuals and countries over agricultural and food systems, which are threatened by corporate-driven globalisation of the agricultural and food sector.

The Forum is developed by participating organisations in an inclusive bottom up process. This process prioritizes the involvement of new groups and organisations from the European continent, particularly in Eastern Europe, because actors of food production in Eastern Europe – decades long isolated from the West – are not aware of possibilities hidden in Food Sovereignty.
With the aim of supporting regional processes the organisers of the Forum are planning a Central-Eastern European section at the Forum in Krems. The main goal of this section is to bring together the actors from this region and to define the main challenges, opportunities and obstacles in order to build food sovereignty at a regional level (in terms of political, economic and social challenges as well). In this section the goal is to get in contact with actors who are working for Food Sovereignty in this region, to inspire and motivate people and organizations from the New Member States to work together on European Food Sovereignty.

More information on the European Food Sovereignty Forum: http://nyeleni2011.net/
Contacts: Nyeleni Europe Secretariat: info@nyelenieurope.net ; Nyeleni Europe – Central-Eastern European Section: Anna Korzenszky: korzanna@gmail.com

Information provided by Anna Korzenszky