WASHINGTON, DC, October 10, 2023 — In advance of the annual celebration of World Food Day by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the US Food Sovereignty Alliance has awarded the annual Food Sovereignty Prize to two outstanding organizations, the Black Dirt Farm Collective, located in Maryland, and Mouvman Peyizan Papay (MPP), based in Haiti. This award is particularly meaningful for MPP at this time, which just celebrated its 50th anniversary amid ongoing political strife, economic depression, and violence in Haiti, prompting an announcement by the UN Security Council to send armed forces into the country.
Recognized internationally, the Food Sovereignty Prize serves as a counterweight to the World Food Prize initiated by Norman Borlaug, the controversial “father of the Green Revolution.” “The World Food Prize typically focuses on expanding production of single crops through expensive, large-scale technology,” said Heather Day, executive director of Community Alliance for Global Justice, a USFSA coordinating member and 2009 recipient of a Food Sovereignty Prize Honorable Mention. “In contrast, the Food Sovereignty Prize champions grassroots, agroecological solutions from the people most harmed by the injustices of the global food system. Mouvman Peyizan Papay and Black Dirt Farm Collective demonstrate community-led farming systems that work toward Black and Indigenous liberation while nourishing humanity and the Earth.”
The Black Dirt Farm Collective is a collective of farmers, educators and organizers that arose from the need to support and protect Black agrarian knowledge in the US mid-Atlantic region. The Collective fights for a just transition using “Afroecology” – the connection between Black agrarianism and agroecology – to build systemic solutions to global food and farm crises. Racial discrimination led to the systematic removal of US Black farmers from the land. Between 1910 and 1997, Black farmers lost roughly 90% of the farmland they collectively owned, and the US Department of Agriculture now reports that fewer than 1% of US farmers are Black. The Black Dirt Farm Collective is committed to reclaiming Black agrarian history, lost generational wealth, and returning to the land.
Shakara Tyler, a returning-generation farmer, educator and organizer and Collective co-founder, summarized one of its essential tenets: “If we are not feeding ourselves our culture, who will?”
Mouvman Peyizan Papay (MPP, or Papaye Peasant Movement) was established in 1973, aligned with the international peasant movement La Via Campesina from the 1990s onward, and has grown to represent more than 60,000 members. The movement empowers rural agricultural workers and focuses on food sovereignty to reclaim Haiti’s independence from global food imports. The Prize committee recognizes MPP’s work combating the ongoing environmental, humanitarian, and hunger crisis in Haiti, worsened by entrenched legacies of colonization, land grabbing, climate change, and foreign exploitation at the expense of local food systems. MPP works directly with local farmers to bolster local food economies through agroecology and build environmental resiliency through planting tens of millions of trees. This inspiring grassroots strategy rejects Haiti’s continued reliance on sporadic international aid in favor of local community control.
“When we received word of this honor during our Food Sovereignty Camp, 450 young peasant leaders let out a thunderous cry of joy,” said MPP leader Jusléne Tyresias. “Through MPP’s 50-year history, Haiti’s peasants have persisted, not only confronting multiple crises head-on, but planting seeds – literally and figuratively – for our people to live with dignity, safety, and sovereignty.”
The Black Dirt Farm Collective and Mouvman Peyizan Papay will be recognized at a virtual ceremony, date and time to be announced soon. The ceremony is free and open to the public. Further information will be made available at www.usfoodsovereigntyalliance.org and www.facebook.com/USFoodSovAlliance.
### The US Food Sovereignty Alliance (USFSA) is comprised of food justice, anti-hunger, labor, environmental, faith-based and food producer groups that work to connect our local and national struggles to the international movement for food sovereignty. The Alliance strives to end poverty, rebuild local food economies and assert democratic control over the food system, believing that all people have the right to healthy, culturally appropriate food produced in an ecologically sound manner.
Food Sovereignty Ghana & Western Organization of Resource Councils (WORC)
Join the ceremony on Thursday, October 13 Register Here for the virtual event emceed by Malik Yakini of the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network
Now in its 14th year, the Food Sovereignty Prize is given annually near World Food Day to a domestic and international organization advancing food sovereignty – the right of all peoples to access healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their food, fishery, and farming systems. It stands in contrast to the corporate-funded World Food Prize, which perpetuates the myth that society can produce its way out of hunger and the climate crisis with biotechnology and synthetic inputs.
The 2022 honorees have fought for years against corporate control of the food system, defending sustainable farming and pasturing, healthy soils, and clean water, building community power, and advocating clean, renewable energy sources. (more…)
FENSUAGRO of Colombia & Eastern Woodlands Rematriation to be Honored on World Food Day
– español abajo –
Register for the virtual event on Oct. 16, 6pm EDT
The US Food Sovereignty Alliance (USFSA) is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2021 Food Sovereignty Prize: The international honoree is the peasant movement FENSUAGRO of Colombia, and the domestic honoree is Eastern Woodlands Rematriation of New England.
Now in its 13th year, the Food Sovereignty Prize is given annually on or around World Food Day to grassroots organizations advancing food sovereignty – the right of all peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems. It stands in contrast to the World Food Prize, which perpetuates the myth that we can produce our way out of hunger.
This year’s honorees have been growing food, defending territory, sharing knowledge, and building power in the face of state violence, the COVID-19 pandemic, and mounting climate chaos.As Colombia’s oldest peasant organization, FENSUAGRO (Federación Nacional Sindical Unitaria Agropecuaria) has led struggles around agrarian reform, food sovereignty, peasant rights, seeds and water since 1976. For decades, in the midst of Colombia’s armed conflict and political unrest, FENSUAGRO members have been resisting, organizing, and supporting peasants, women and youth to build dignified lives for themselves and their communities. It has nurtured the growth of the Latin American Agroecological Institute (IALA) Maria Cano, an inspiring educational space for young farmers.
Eastern Woodlands Rematriation (EWR) is a grassroots collective led entirely by Indigenous two-spirits, womxn, and Indigequeer folx of New England. EWR operates as a mutual support network for tribal food producers, farmers, medicine keepers, fisher folk, and hunters based within their respective tribal homelands. Through capacity building, infrastructure, technical support, and formation spaces for coordinated political organizing, EWR enhances and safekeeps sacred sites and supports agroecology. Its practice is rooted in the exchange of ancestral knowledge and traditional foods through mutual aid.
Eastern Woodlands Rematriation receives this recognition as Indigenous movements throughout the world are waging numerous high-stakes struggles in defense of land and territory — from the Line 3 pipeline protests in the US Midwest to Brazil’s largest ever Indigenous mobilizations taking place in Brasilia — underscoring the centrality of Indigenous struggles to the global struggle for food sovereignty. EWR also embodies a deeply intersectional approach to food sovereignty.
Both honorees will be recognized at the 2021 Food Sovereignty Prize Ceremony held on World Food Day, October 16, 2021 at 6 PM Eastern time/5 PM Colombian time. The ceremony will be held virtually and anchored by an in-person event sponsored by USFSA members Sustainable Agriculture of Louisville and Food in Neighborhoods Community Coalition. Simultaneous English/Spanish interpretation will be provided.
Registration is required to attend this free event: Register for the virtual event here.
For more information, contact info[at]usfoodsovereigntyalliance.org.
About the US Food Sovereignty Alliance:
The US Food Sovereignty Alliance (USFSA) is a US-based alliance of food justice, anti-hunger, labor, environmental, faith-based and food producer groups that upholds the right to food as a basic human right and works to connect our local and national struggles to the international movement for food sovereignty. The Alliance works to end poverty, rebuild local food economies and assert democratic control over the food system, believing that all people have the right to healthy, culturally appropriate food produced in an ecologically sound manner. Learn more at usfoodsovereigntyalliance.org.
FENSUAGRO de Colombia y la Eastern Woodsland Rematriation (Remediación de los Bosques del Este) serán homenajeados en el Día Mundial de la Alimentación
Inscríbase en el evento virtual del 16 de octubre, 6pm EDT
La Alianza de la Soberanía Alimentaria de los Estados Unidos (USFSA) se complace en anunciar a los ganadores del Premio a la Soberanía Alimentaria 2021: El ganador internacional es la Federación Nacional Sindical Unitaria Agropecuaria (FENSUAGRO) de Colombia, y el ganador nacional es Eastern Woodlands Rematriation (la Rematriación de los Bosques del Este) de Nueva Inglaterra.
El Premio a la Soberanía Alimentaria, actualmente en su decimotercera edición, se otorga anualmente en torno al Día Mundial de la Alimentación, a las organizaciones de base que promueven la soberanía alimentaria, es decir, a el derecho de todos los pueblos a alimentos sanos y culturalmente apropiados, producidos con métodos ecológicamente racionales y sostenibles, y con su prerrogativa a definir sus propios sistemas alimentarios y agrícolas. El Premio a la Soberanía Alimentaria contrasta con el Premio Mundial de la Alimentación, que perpetúa el mito de la producción industrial para salir del hambre.
Los ganadores de este año han estado cultivando alimentos, defendiendo el territorio, compartiendo conocimientos y construyendo poder frente a la violencia del Estado, la pandemia del COVID-19 y el creciente caos climático.
Como la organización campesina más antigua de Colombia, FENSUAGRO ha liderado las luchas en torno a la reforma agraria, la soberanía alimentaria, los derechos de los campesinos, las semillas y el agua desde 1976. Durante décadas, en medio del conflicto armado y la inestabilidad política de Colombia, los miembros de FENSUAGRO han resistido, organizado y apoyado a los campesinos, las mujeres y los jóvenes para que construyan vidas dignas para ellos y sus comunidades. Entre sus logros, está el crecimiento del Instituto Agroecológico Latinoamericano (IALA) María Cano, un espacio educativo inspirador para los jóvenes agricultores.
Eastern Woodlands Rematriation (EWR) es un colectivo de base dirigido íntegramente por indígenas de dos espíritus, mujeres, y gente Indigequeer de Nueva Inglaterra. EWR funciona como una red de apoyo mutuo para los productores tribales de alimentos, agricultores, guardianes de la medicina, pescadores y cazadores basados en sus respectivas tierras tribales. A través de la creación de capacidades, infraestructuras, apoyo técnico y espacios de formación para la organización política coordinada, EWR mejora y protege los lugares sagrados y apoya la agroecología. Su práctica se basa en el intercambio de conocimientos ancestrales y alimentos tradicionales a través de la ayuda mutua.
Eastern Woodlands Rematriation recibe este reconocimiento en un momento en que los movimientos indígenas de todo el mundo están llevando a cabo numerosas luchas profundas en defensa de la tierra y el territorio -desde las protestas por el oleoducto de la Línea 3 en el Medio Oeste de Estados Unidos hasta las mayores movilizaciones indígenas de la historia en Brasil-, lo que subraya la importancia de las luchas indígenas en la lucha mundial por la soberanía alimentaria. EWR también encarna un enfoque profundamente interseccional de la soberanía alimentaria.
Ambos ganadores serán reconocidos en la ceremonia del Premio a la Soberanía Alimentaria 2021, que se celebrará el Día Mundial de la Alimentación, el 16 de octubre de 2021, a las 18:00 horas (hora del este) y a las 17:00 horas (hora de Colombia). La ceremonia se llevará a cabo de manera virtual y será acompañada por un evento presencial patrocinado por el miembros de la USFSA, Agricultura Sostenible de Louisville y la Coalición Comunitaria de Alimentos en los Barrios. Habrá interpretación simultánea inglés/español.
Es necesario registrarse para asistir a este evento gratuito: Regístrese para el evento virtual aquí.
Para más información, contacte al info[at]usfoodsovereigntyalliance.org.
La Alianza de la Soberanía Alimentaria de los Estados Unidos (USFSA) es una alianza con sede en los Estados Unidos de grupos de justicia alimentaria, lucha contra el hambre, laborales, medioambientales, religiosos y productores de alimentos que defiende el derecho a la alimentación como un derecho humano básico y trabaja para conectar nuestras luchas locales y nacionales con el movimiento internacional por la soberanía alimentaria. La Alianza trabaja para poner fin a la pobreza, reconstruir las economías alimentarias locales y afirmar el control democrático sobre el sistema alimentario, con la convicción de que todas las personas tienen derecho a alimentos sanos y culturalmente apropiados producidos de forma ecológica. Más información en usfoodsovereigntyalliance.org
[Soomaali hoose | नेपाली तल | Española abajo] The 12th Food Sovereignty Prize was awarded on World Food Day in October 2020 to the Somali Bantu Community Association of Maineand the All Nepal Peasants’ Federation. The Prize – awarded to one U.S. and one international group each year – highlights grassroots efforts to meet urgent needs while advancing transformative Food Sovereignty solutions. Organized by the US Food Sovereignty Alliance (USFSA), the Food Sovereignty Prize is recognized as a counterweight to the World Food Prize, which critics decry for its singular focus on food production based on Green Revolution approaches. The Prize ceremony was held on December 9 and included a mistica, live music, photos from Nepal and Maine, and speeches by the winners. Learn more about the honorees here.
Abaalmarinta 12aad ee Gobannimada Cunnada waxaa la siiyay Maalinta Cuntada Adduunka ee Oktoobar 2020 iyada oo la siiyay Ururka Bulshada Bantu Bantu ee Maine iyo Xiriirka Dhammaan Dadka Reer Nepal. Abaalmarinta – oo la siiyo hal Mareykan ah iyo hal koox caalami ah sannad kasta – waxay muujineysaa dadaallada aasaasiga ah ee lagu daboolayo baahiyaha deg-degga ah iyadoo la sii wanaajinayo xallinta Gobannimada Cunnada.Abaalmarinta Madaxbanaanida Cuntada waxaa soo qabanqaabiyey Isbahaysiga Gobannimada Cunnada Mareykanka (USFSA), Abaalmarinta Madaxbanaanida Cuntada waxaa loo aqoonsan yahay inay tahay miisaan ka soo horjeeda Abaalmarinta Cuntada Adduunka, taas oo dhaleeceeyayaashu ay ka soo horjeedaan diiraddeeda gaarka ah ee soo saarista cuntada ee ku saleysan hababka Revolution Green.Xafladda Abaalmarinta ayaa la qabtay 9-kii Diseembar waxaana ka mid ahaa mistica, muusig toos ah, sawirro laga soo qaaday Nepal iyo Maine, iyo khudbado ay jeediyeen guuleystayaasha.Ka baro wax badan oo ku saabsan maamuusayaasha halkan.
१२ औं खाद्य सार्वभौमिकता पुरस्कार अक्टोबर २०२० मा विश्व खाद्य दिवसमा सोमाली बन्तु सामुदायिक संघ माईने र अखिल नेपाल किसान महासंघलाई पुरस्कृत गरियो।पुरस्कार – प्रत्येक अमेरिकी र एक अन्तर्राष्ट्रिय समूहलाई पुरस्कृत गरिएको – परिवर्तनकारी खाना सार्वभौमिकता समाधानहरूको अगाडि बढाउँदै तत्काल आवश्यकताहरू पूरा गर्न तल्लो तहको प्रयासलाई जोड दिन्छ।अमेरिकी खाद्य सार्वभौमिकता गठबन्धन (युएसएफएसए) द्वारा आयोजना गरिएको, खाद्य सार्वभौमिकता पुरस्कार विश्व खाद्य पुरस्कारको काउन्टरवेटको रूपमा मान्यता प्राप्त छ, जुन आलोचकहरूले हरित क्रान्तिमा आधारित खाद्य उत्पादनमा एकल ध्यान केन्द्रित गर्ने निर्णय गर्छन्।पुरस्कार समारोह डिसेम्बर on मा आयोजित गरिएको थियो र एक मिसिका, प्रत्यक्ष संगीत, नेपाल र माइनको फोटो, र विजेताहरु द्वारा भाषण थियो।होनोरिजको बारेमा यहाँ अधिक जान्नुहोस्।
El 12º Premio a la Soberanía Alimentaria se concedió en el Día Mundial de la Alimentación de octubre de 2020 a la Asociación de la Comunidad Bantú Somalí de Maine y a la Federación de Campesinos de Todo Nepal. El Premio -que se otorga a un grupo estadounidense y a otro internacional cada año- destaca los esfuerzos de las bases para satisfacer las necesidades urgentes al tiempo que se promueven soluciones transformadoras de la Soberanía Alimentaria. Organizado por la Alianza para la Soberanía Alimentaria de los Estados Unidos (USFSA), el Premio a la Soberanía Alimentaria es reconocido como un contrapeso al Premio Mundial de la Alimentación, que los críticos critican por su singular enfoque en la producción de alimentos basada en los enfoques de la Revolución Verde. La ceremonia de entrega del Premio se celebró el 9 de diciembre e incluyó una mistica, música en directo, fotos de Nepal y Maine, y discursos de los ganadores. Conozca más sobre los galardonados aquí.
The US Food Sovereignty Alliance (
Eastern Woodlands Rematriation (EWR) is a grassroots collective led entirely by Indigenous two-spirits, womxn, and Indigequeer folx of New England. EWR operates as a mutual support network for tribal food producers, farmers, medicine keepers, fisher folk, and hunters based within their respective tribal homelands. Through capacity building, infrastructure, technical support, and formation spaces for coordinated political organizing, EWR enhances and safekeeps sacred sites and supports agroecology. Its practice is rooted in the exchange of ancestral knowledge and traditional foods through mutual aid.
Eastern Woodlands Rematriation (EWR) es un colectivo de base dirigido íntegramente por indígenas de dos espíritus, mujeres, y gente Indigequeer de Nueva Inglaterra. EWR funciona como una red de apoyo mutuo para los productores tribales de alimentos, agricultores, guardianes de la medicina, pescadores y cazadores basados en sus respectivas tierras tribales. A través de la creación de capacidades, infraestructuras, apoyo técnico y espacios de formación para la organización política coordinada, EWR mejora y protege los lugares sagrados y apoya la agroecología. Su práctica se basa en el intercambio de conocimientos ancestrales y alimentos tradicionales a través de la ayuda mutua.
Eastern Woodlands Rematriation recibe este reconocimiento en un momento en que los movimientos indígenas de todo el mundo están llevando a cabo numerosas luchas profundas en defensa de la tierra y el territorio -desde las 