UNA-USA Dane County Events

Our speaker, John E. Peck grew up on a 260 acre farm in central Minnesota, has a B.A. in Economics from Reed College and a PhD in Land Resources from UW-Madison. He is currently executive director of Family Farm Defenders, and is also a part-time instructor of Economics and Environmental Studies at Madison Area Technical College (MATC). 

As  a North American delegate for Via Campesina, John has also participated in the Nyleni Food Sovereignty Conference in Selingue, Mali in Oct. 2008, the Fifth Conference of Via Conference in Maputo Mozambique in Oct. 2008, as well as the U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP15) in Copenhagen, Denmark in Dec. 2009.

Family Farmer Defenders is a national nonprofit grassroots organization based in Madison, WI that promotes sustainable agriculture, rural justice, workers rights, animal welfare, consumer safety, fair trade, and food sovereignty. Since its founding fifteen years ago, Family Farm Defenders has been dedicated to empowering farmers and consumers towards reclaiming their local food/farm systems.

John Peck's talk: Moving From Food Crisis to Food Sovereignty  - Reclaiming Our Agricultural System from Corporate Control

As the global food crisis worsens due to commodity speculation and corporate globalization, there is also incredible growth in the worldwide grassroots movement to reclaim agriculture for the benefit of farmers and consumers alike.  Under the alternative concept of food sovereignty first coined by Via Campesina in 1996, communities from Haiti to Detroit are reasserting their local control over what they grow, raise, and eat.

The 2008 study by the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science, and Technology for Development (known as the IAASTD), sponsored by the World Bank and five United Nations agencies, basically states that sustainable agriculture is the way to feed the world (and solve climate change) and NOT conventional industrial agriculture.  This study was conducted by over 400 scientists and development experts from more than 80 countries, and its results have been endorsed by 58 countries, but it's findings fly in the face of the Gene Revolution agenda of the World Bank, Gates Foundation, FAO, USAID, etc. - which is why it has caused so much controversy.  This specific study (and the concept of food sovereignty in general) has a many implications for the U.N. Millenium Development Goals.