United Nations Declaration on the Right of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas

 

 

 

United Nations Declaration on the Right of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas

Carla Mucavi, Director, FAO Liaison Office with the United Nations in New York

 

 

Ladies and gentlemen, all protocols observed.

Through the Permanent Mission of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, I would like to thank the co-sponsors for organising such an important side event.

I want to start by welcoming the efforts of all those that have actively engaged during the six years of negotiations of the UN declaration on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas. Many are in this room and on this podium. I am honored to be here with you.

FAO has provided support throughout this process and we share the excitement with its near adoption.

FAO considers the declaration a landmark. In fact, just last week, during his mission to New York, FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva stressed that the declaration would support efforts to end poverty, achieve Zero Hunger, and fulfill the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development as a whole.  

I want to highlight three aspects of the declaration that FAO considers especially relevant.

First, the Declaration recognizes the vulnerabilities of peasants and rural people. And evidence shows that they are being left behind. For instance:

Globally, the poverty rate in rural areas is more than three times higher than in urban areas. Rural areas account for  over half of the world’s population and  concentrate 79 percent of the total poor, according to a recent World Bank report.

• The UN Water Synthesis Report on SDG 6 reveals that 70 percent of the 2 billion people without basic sanitation services live in rural areas.
• The Report of the Special Rapporteur on Right to Food also shows how the wages of agricultural workers are generally low, paid late and not periodically adjusted and how only 20 percent of agricultural workers have access to basic social protection.

 

In this context, the declaration is a timely and necessary reminder that peasants and rural people have the same rights as all of us, and that more needs to be done so they can realize their rights.

Second, the declaration recognizes the contribution that peasants and other people working in rural areas give to sustainable development.

They are custodians of biodiversity. Indigenous peoples’ territories, for example, hold eighty percent of the world’s biodiversity.

And they are producers of food. Ninety percent of the farms in the world are run by families. Family farmers produce over 80 percent of the world’s food in terms of value

Let us not also overlook the fact that, paradoxically, peasants and rural people are often poor and food insecure themselves, that one in every nine people is undernourished and that one-third of all food produced in the world is lost or wasted.

These are all symptoms of broken food systems that need to be transformed so that they are more resilient, sustainable and inclusive.

Peasants and other people working in rural areas have a crucial role to play in this transformation. Their role is even more important today as we are seeing a rise in hunger, reversing years of progress. According to SOFI, today, 821 million people are undernourished.

In this regard, and this is my third point, let me emphasize the need to include rural people in the public policy process. This dialogue, which is called for in the declaration, has already proven to be successful in other food security contexts, nationally and internationally.

At the global level, dialogue and inclusiveness were central to the elaboration of the right to food guidelines, and they are in the DNA of the Committee on World Food Security and its products, including the voluntary guidelines on responsible governance of tenure and the principle for responsible investments in agriculture and food systems.

 

Ladies and gentlemen,

FAO welcomes the Declaration, but this will only be a first step. We will measure success by how the declaration impacts the lives of peasants and other people working in rural areas.

This will require a wide range of actions, including capacity building; establishing local, national and global spaces for dialogue; investing in sustainable, resilient and inclusive rural development and food systems; strengthening social protection; and supporting rural women, youth, and indigenous peoples.

This is an effort that must explore and maximize synergies that exist. In this regard, let me point out that the UN Decade on Family Farming that begins next year can provide an operational framework to act on some of the issues raised in the declaration.

To end, I would like to reaffirm FAO's commitment to support the implementation of the declaration, working with governments, civil society organizations including social movements, and producer organizations, with indigenous peoples, the private sector, the academia and the UN family.

Thank you for your attention.