PBI-Honduras notes the self-organizing of the National Union of Rural Workers on the International Day of Peasant Struggle

PBI-Honduras is marking the International Day of Peasant Struggle, April 17, with the above quote from the National Union of Rural Workers (CNTC). It says: “We are self-organizing. We cannot just sit around waiting for the agrarian laws to help us.”

The fuller quote reads: “We are self-organizing. We are going to sow a total of 40,000 manzanas (approximately 28,000 hectares) of maize and other products. Because we can’t sit on our hands waiting for agrarian laws to help us.”

The CNTC is a small-scale farming and trade union organization that fights for a more just distribution of land in Honduras. Its aim is to support affiliated small-scale farming families so that they have access to land.

PBI-Honduras has noted: “Of the 404 communities that form the CNTC, just 20% have titles to their lands. Many others have worked and lived on their lands for three or four decades and have spent 15 years awaiting the official recognition of their rights that never seems to arrive.”

Overall, land distribution in Honduras is highly unequal.

Just 5% of large-scale farmers control almost two thirds of all cultivable land, while 71% of small-scale farmers have access to just 5% of it.

We recall that Canada abstained in the vote on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and other people working in rural areas that was adopted by the UN General Assembly in December 2018.

PBI-Honduras has noted that this UN Declaration recognizes key elements such as “the right to land, to natural resources and to food sovereignty, based on the principle of equality between men and women.”

Despite Canada’s abstention, the resolution in support of the Declaration passed.

PBI Honduras has been accompanying CNTC since May 2018.

#DíaDeLaLuchaCampesina

Franklin Almendares, General Secretary, National Union of Rural Workers (CNTC).