Dear friends and supporters,
Welcome to our August newsletter! We’ve been busy, working away especially on TTIP and agroecology over the last month. In many ways, these two strands of the agri-food world are poles apart. One deals with corporations on both sides of the Atlantic, and their cronies, trying to make labour, environment, health and safety rules weaker. The other presents solutions for making agri-food, rural communities and the living world better. Can you guess which is which? :-) Both these areas, as well as a shocking story on farm labour from Romania, a positive story on pesticides and people power, as well as lots of useful dates for upcoming events, make up the core of this August newsletter. More highlights from our recent posts include:
Don’t forget we have a regularly updated newsticker (recent updates include TTIP, bees, ‘fat tax’, pesticides & biodiversity), the 2000m² project, and we are very active on both facebook and twitter. Feel free to connect up with us over there in social media land. And why not forward this newsletter to someone you think might be interested in getting a once-a-month digest of the kind of news from around Europe we provide?
Dr. Oliver Moore – oliver@arc2020.eu
Communications ManagerLuise Körner – communication@arc2020.eu
Communications team
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TTIP: The webinar series by ARC2020 and IATP
“People and organisations need to find out more about this, ask questions to your policy makers, your elected officials on what is really happening with this and voice your concerns on TTIP and AMR.” Shefali Sharma urged in closing the webinar on TTIP and Antimicrobial Resistance co-hosted by IATP and ARC2020. This webinar was part of a series we brought to you in July. These webinars are a great way to keep informed, to get up to date, detailed analysis of key TTIP issues. In case you missed it, you can find a thorough analysis as well as the recordings on our site. Three webinars, on GM, pork/poultry & AMR are also to be found in a dedicated section on Arc2020.eu.
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Great success: Syngenta to shelve its plans due to public outcry
Pollinator campaigners in the UK are celebrating after pesticide giant Syngenta shelved its plans to tear down the EU moratorium on neonicotinoids with an application for an “emergency” derogation. The weight of public pressure brought to bear on politicians made it impossible for them to be seen signing off an act of environmental vandalism. Read the entire story here.How does the UK regulate pesticide use? ARC2020’s UK correspondent Peter Crosskey takes a closer look in his report on our website.
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Agroecology
Agroecology has farming, scientific and social movement strands. One of the things we’re trying to do in Arc2020 is to draw these together. And we also want to push forward two things. The first is a strong agroecology which works with citizen-consumers, distribution, resource issues, policy issues and production. The second is to place agroecology front and centre in the development of a holistic, integrated agri-food policy for Europe. To this end, helping to bring these food system and also farming, science & social movement strands together, into a coherent community of practice, will be key.
Our agroecological project has already initiated this process. In partnership with our Friends of the Earth colleagues from around Europe, CAP information events, tours, farmers’ markets and more activities are being organised. Arc2020’s Samuel Feret and Oliver Moore will also be making the case for both this project and a strong agroecology at the upcoming European Organic Congress and the UN FAO’s agroecology event for (Food and Nutrition Security) respectively. We’ll keep you posted!
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Upcoming Events and Policy Dates
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Working 12 hours a day for a loaf of bread in Romania
Can you believe that this still happens, today, in the EU. In 2014? Working 12 hours a day for the basic bare minimum of sustenance to keep working? While its easy to get immune, somewhat, to agri-food shocks, this story really struck us here in Arc2020. Over the years, Attila Szocs and Eco Ruralis have provided some very strong stories, which have proven to be very popular with our readers. This one is powerful, and we really encourage you to read it, take its impact in, and share it far and wide:
“According to one farm manager, in 2013 day laborers worked all spring and summer just for some food: they received a daily quota of food products, bread, oil or flour produced by InterAgro’s facilities. At the beginning of the year they also received a hot meal, but then it was reduced to one bread per day.”
Read the full article here.
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