- Travel to Tlaxcala or other agricultural states with a WFP (or Casa de los Amigos) delegation to learn how you can change US policies that threaten food scarcity.
- Ask your congressional representative to support the TRADE Act, which would renegotiate NAFTA to protect small farmers and the environment.
- Learn more about the impacts of GMO’s and unfair trade policies through Witness for Peace, Bread for the World, or Sin Maiz No Hay Pais.Hay Pais.
In this small, rural community, about two hours
east of Mexico City, in the mountainous highlands, indigenous farmers have been
growing corn and other crops for thousands of years. In 1980, faced with
poverty and nutrition problems caused by eating too much processed foods, they formed the organization Grupo Vicente Guerrero (GVG)
to revive traditional agricultural practices and cultivate a healthier
lifestyle.
Visiting Vicente Guerrero, located in the state of
Tlaxcala, was a clear high point of the Social Action Study Tour we took
through the Casa de los amigos a Quaker center in Mexico City. Jill and I were deeply moved and inspired by what we witnessed
here.
Creating a vast network of Empowered Campesinos
The small farmers (campesinos) of Vicente Guerrero were so successful they began teaching sustainable
agricultural practices to others through a program called Campesino
a Campesino that is reaching small farmers throughout Latin America
and beyond. January 13, 2011, GVG helped pass a law in Tlaxcala that “protects
local, native corn from unfair competition and contamination with
genetically-modified and imported varieties.” This law prevents Monsanto from
introducing Genetically Modified (GMO) corn into their area. Inspired by
GVG’s success, groups in other parts of Mexico are working to pressure their
state governments to pass similar laws to protect corn and other agricultural
products through lobbying and through a class action law suit.
Corn is so central to Mexican identity and
livelihood that many Mexicans feel very passionate about preserving indigenous
varieties. There’s a banner at GVC with the famous saying of Nobel Prize
winning poet Octavio Paz: “The invention of corn for Mexicans is comparable
only to the invention of fire by man.”
“The corn that we inherited from our forefathers
that fed our families for the last nine thousand years,” says Adrian Pérez
Conteras one of the organizers of GVG’s campaign. “We feel that just as our
grandparents left us this rich heritage, we should continue preserving it.”
Early Quaker Support
Casa de los Amigos has been a key supporter of GVG
since its inception. In 1973, Rogelio Cova Juárez, the director of the Casa at
the time, helped start the process leading to the formation of GVG in 1980.
During a period of around four years, Erick Holt and Kaky Ruthmore, two members
of the Casa team, helped various Vicente Guerrero residents learn to cultivate
gardens using a bio-intensive method, and began promoting this through
volunteers in three other communities in the municipality of Españita.
The Casa has supported GVG at various times and in various ways throughout its history. We felt
privileged to be part of a Casa-sponsored tour consisting of around eleven
Quakers from all over the USA.
After a pleasant drive through beautiful
mountainous Mexican countryside filled with maguey and burros and terraced
fields, we reached the peaceful little town of Vicente Guerrero—a welcome
change from the urban sprawl of Mexico City, with a population of 21 million.
In this town of fewer than 1,000 people we were greeted by two local leaders,
Clara Sanchez and a man named Gabriel Franco Sánchez. Gabriel proudly
introduced himself as “100% campesino.”
Restoring Dignity and
Community and Culture
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This was remarkable since many campesinos are
ashamed of their identity, seeing
their lifestyle as a dead end and wanting to
migrate to the city or to the USA. As GVG organizer Pánfilo Hernández
notes, “I’ve seen some small scale farmers who don’t value their identity
as campesinos, even in front of their own children sometimes. They
say, ‘I don’t want you to end up like me becausecampesinos always
have the same problem: we never get anywhere.’”
Gabriel, however, made it clear he had reason to
proud as he explained to us the traditional practices that have made Vicente
Guerrero a model of sustainable agriculture.
He showed us how terraced farming made it possible
to grow corn without irrigation. He and Clara explained how their seed banks
include a wide variety of seeds adapted to changes in the growing season
caused, in part, by climate change.
By not using insecticide, they are learning to
harvest insects like grasshoppers and worms that used to be part of the
traditional Mexican diet and now are becoming fashionable once again. See http://www.puertovallarta.net/fast_facts/mexicos-edible-insects-3.php. The residents of Vicente Guerrero have also become adept in using
local plants in a variety of ways. We were shown how to make a salve using
calendula, otherwise known as pot marigold, which is highly favored for its
skin healing properties. It is also excellent for sensitive skin, making it
perfect for using with babies and children. Products such as this salve and
edible insects are sold in local farmers’ markets.
Restoring Food Diversity and Sovereignty
Clara, who was just chosen as the leader of the
organization GVC, showed us twelve different varieties of corn—red, yellow,
white, purple— that have been developed at Vicente Guerrero. We are told that
there are at least 62 varieties of corn in their state of Tlaxcala, perhaps as
many as 200, in Mexico, each type especially suited to various micro-climates. If the mono-cropping
methods of Monsanto and other GMO seed companies have their way, the bio
diversity essential to create healthy bodies and healthy soil and sustainable
agriculture will be greatly diminished. These
varieties are At Vicente Guerrero, seeds are
preserved and shared with farmers who are given the seeds and then “return”
them after the harvest, with “pay it foward” (i.e. if they borrow a pound of
seeds, they return, say, two pounds). In contrast, Monsanto seeds have been genetically engineered so that
they must be purchased anew each year. This has creates impossible costs and dependency
and has led to bankruptcies and suicides among small farmers. In India a
quarter of a million farmers have committed suicide in the last 16 years
because of economic distress caused by Monsanto’s “suicide seeds.” Furthermore,
Monsanto seeds, insecticides and herbicides alter the soil so that it becomes
difficult, if not impossible, to use for natural farming. The campesinos at
Vicente Guerrero and in many other parts of Mexico are determined to make sure
that what is happening in India doesn’t happen in Mexico. They want what they
call “food sovereignty.”
Seeds of Hope for the World
Born out of the GVG network, Small farmers throughout Mexico have formed an
alliance to fight against
the invasion of
Monsanto and GMO corn: “On July 5, 2013, the
alliance filed a class-action lawsuit to stop the Mexican government from
granting permits to plant GMO maize. Later that fall, a judge ruled that both
experimental and commercial plantings would have to wait until a final verdict
is reached, which could take many more months or even years.”
This is good news indeed, but the struggle is far
from over, and the suit is not yet settled. And, we North Americans need to do
our part.
Witness for Peace recommends three ways you can
help small farmers in Mexico:
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