Famine Walk 2014: From Famine to Food Sovereignty

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Coni Ledesma (left) and Luis Jalandoni (right) from the Philippines unveil a Famine Memorial on the grounds of Delphi Lodge during the 2014 Famine Walk. Photo: Rob Fairmichael

Where can you start in talking about the Afri Famine Walk? Well, 1849 is the best point because the Famine Walk is the re-enactment or retracing steps of a real tragedy that happened to people who died walking that way 165 years ago. There is a sense in which the ground we walk on is sacred, holy, or marked because we know some of the terrible things happened in that very place.

But the Afri Famine Walk is not some ethereal revisiting of a past, if tragic, time. It very directly links past, present – what is happening in the world today with causes similar to or the same as what caused and exacerbated the Great Famine in Ireland – and future – and asks us to recommit ourselves to ending famine. There was food, there is food, the question is who controls the food and what happens to it. Some walkers carried posters of the names of individuals who died in that and more recent famines. Continue reading “Famine Walk 2014: From Famine to Food Sovereignty” →

Ireland’s First Food Sovereignty Assembly

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Food Sovereignty AssemblyIreland’s First Food Sovereignty Assembly

Organised by Food Sovereignty Ireland and Afri

Castlebar, 16th May 2014 at 7.30pm

Gaining control of our food

A panel of distinguished speakers will lead discussions at Ireland’s first food sovereignty assembly in Castlebar, County Mayo this weekend. Food sovereignty practitioners from around Ireland will also attend and contribute to this important event which is organised to coincide with the annual Doolough Famine Walk which takes place the following day.

Contributors to the assembly will include Paul Nicholson of Via Campesina, Luis Jalandoni who has been involved with peasant settlers and sugar workers in the Philippines, John Brennan of Leitrim Organic Farmers Coop Rose Kelly of Afri, Fergal Anderson of Food Sovereignty Ireland and more. The Assembly will explore the critical issue of food, how it works, who benefits and who loses out and why.

Organisers believe that government and agribusinesses are obscuring the story of how the food system works in Ireland and internationally – and that it is time for some home truths

Stepping into your local supermarket is like going to the arrivals hall of an international airport. Apples from New Zealand, chickens from Thailand, cabbages from Holland and pork from god knows where. Almost all the meat or dairy you see, Irish or not, has been fed animal feeds (mostly GM soya) from Argentina and Brazil.

The reality is that this globalization of our food and agricultural system is failing consumers, the environment and farmers. Big retailers like Tesco are multi-national corporations, squeezing suppliers and eliminating local food providers. Much of the food they sell is produced mechanically, on industrial farms, in a multitude of countries using a cocktail of agrochemicals. The industrial food system then sells heavily processed foods with dubious labels to overwhelmed consumers, who eventually discard almost a third of the food they buy. Continue reading “Ireland’s First Food Sovereignty Assembly” →

Food Sovereignty Assembly: Gaining Control of Our Food

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Food Sovereignty AssemblyFood Sovereignty Assembly: Gaining Control of Our Food

Friday 16th May, 7.30pm

TF Royal Hotel, Old Westport Road, Castlebar, Co. Mayo (opposite Mayo General Hospital)

Our food system is failing, both in Ireland and internationally. Failing to provide a secure income for farmers, failing to provide healthy food for citizens, and failing to nurture and care for our environment and the heritage of future generations.

The globalisation of agricultural markets long promised to bring prosperity and stability to farmers and consumers. Instead we have seen the eradication of our own local and traditional high quality food production and an abundance of low quality, mass produced food. Farmers cannot guarantee prices which cover the costs of their production and are increasingly trapped in a vicious circle of falling prices and rising input costs.

Furthermore, processors and retailers undermine and fail to reward the work that farmers do by selling adulterated and heavily processed food to citizens. At the same time, organisations, individuals and collectives are developing new ways of organising the production, distribution and consumption of food in their localities. They propose an alternative political framework for food and agriculture in our society, based on the principles of Food Sovereignty.

Food Sovereignty means the people of Ireland reclaiming the right to how our food system is organised. It means dignity for farmers in their work, and healthy food for Irish citizens. It means ensuring high quality food for our local markets instead of high quantities for global markets. It means working with nature and developing production systems which do not rely on external inputs. It means citizens and farmers coming together to take a stand and build a better way of producing, distributing and consuming food in Ireland and around the world.

This conference in Castlebar is a first step in starting this discussion, and towards building a better food and agricultural system both in Ireland and worldwide.

It will include contributions from Paul Nicholson (Basque Farmers Union and member of Via Campesina), Luis Jalandoni (involved with sugar workers and peasant settlers in Negros, Central Philippines), John Brennan (Leitrim Organic Farmers Coop), Rose Kelly (Afri) and a speaker from United Farmers Association.

Join us on the 16th May at 7.30pm in the TF Royal Hotel, Old Westport Road, Castlebar, Co. Mayo (opposite Mayo General Hospital).

Organised by Afri in association with Food Sovereignty Ireland.  This event is organised to coincide with the Annual Famine Walk in the Doolough Valley, Co. Mayo.  For details about the Famine Walk, go here or see our Facebook event

You can also download the Food Sovereignty Assembly Brochure 

Impressions from Féile Bríde 2014

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This year’s Féile Bríde aimed to mark the issues of “Life: Source or Resource-Enslavement versus sovereignty.”  The day started with the beautiful music of harpist Fionnuala Gill as the Brigid flame was carried into the conference hall.  The event made connections across borders, nations and nationalities, attracting speakers and partners from East Africa to the West of Ireland, in order to tackle together the unequal distribution of resources and the threats to food sovereignty.

Contributors to Féile Bríde 2014: (from left to right): Abjata Khalif (Kenya Pastoralist Journalist Network); Mia De Faoite (Turn off the Red Light campaigner); Donal Dorr (author, theologian and Turn off the Red Light campaigner); Fergal Anderson (farmer and Food Sovereignty Ireland), and Pete Mullineaux (poet, dramatist and arts facilitator). Photo: Joe Murray

Speakers included Afri’s partner Abjata Khalif of the Kenyan pastoralist Journalist Network, Fergal Anderson a small farmer from the west of Ireland, veteran writer and campaigner on issues of human trafficking, Donal Dorr, and Mia De Faoite, a survivor of prostitution speaking from her experience. Continue reading “Impressions from Féile Bríde 2014” →

Date for your Diary – Féile Bríde 2014

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Féile Bríde 2014 will take place on Saturday 8th February in the Osborne Centre in Kildare town. The title of this year’s Féile Bríde is “Life: Source or Resource – Enslavement versus Sovereignty”.

Féile Bríde 2014 will look at issues of life, light and liberty with perspectives from our partner Abjata Khalif of the Kenya Pastoralist Journalists Network; from Fergal Anderson linking food sovereignty issues locally and globally, as a ‘small farmer’ from the West of Ireland; and Donal Dorr will be joined by a woman with personal knowledge of the issue of human trafficking to explore the meaning of slavery, sovereignty and sustenance. Continue reading “Date for your Diary – Féile Bríde 2014” →

Impressions from Famine Walk 2013

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From Left: Joe Murray (Afri), Salome Mbugua (Akidwa), Fergal Anderson (Food Sovereignty Movement), Gary White Deer (Choctaw Artist), Declan O’Rourke (Musician) and Michael Wade (Delphi Lodge). Photo: Derek Speirs

2013 marked the 26th Afri Famine Walk – this walk having taken place every year since 1988. About 200 hundred people took part in the walk in atrocious weather conditions. The Walk leaders were Fergal Anderson of the Food Sovereignty Movement, Salome Mbugua from Northern Kenya and Choctaw Gary White Deer. We had music from Declan O’Rourke and Emer Mayock.

The Walk is an expression of respect, remembrance and solidarity with those who gathered in Louisburgh in search of food in March 1849.  It is also a walk of solidarity with all who have died and continue to die as a result of poverty and hunger in Ireland and throughout the world today.

This year’s walk had added significance because for the first time it retraced the exact route taken by the people in whose memory it is organised – an estimated 600 people who gathered in Louisburgh in March 1849 in the hope of meeting ‘commissioners’ who would certify them as paupers, which would entitle them to a ration of food or admission to the workhouse.  However, the commissioners failed to appear in Louisburgh and the message was conveyed that they would meet the people in Delphi Lodge instead. Continue reading “Impressions from Famine Walk 2013” →

Famine Walk 2013: Opening The Gates – Sowing New Seeds

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Famine Walk 2013: Opening The Gates – Sowing New Seeds

Opening the Gates - Sowing New Seeds

Saturday May 18th 2013

From Louisburgh to Delphi Lodge, Co. Mayo

Registration from 12.45pm; Walk beginning at 1.30pm

Walk Leaders: Gary White Deer, Salome Mbugua, Fergal Anderson

Music: Declan O’Rourke

 

For the first time since its inception in 1988, the Afri Famine Walk will complete the journey from Louisburgh to Delphi Lodge – the exact route of the original ‘journey of horror’ of March 30th/31st 1849. The immediate cause of what became known as ‘the death march’ was the news that two ‘commissioners’, Colonel Hogrove and Captain Primrose, would arrive in Louisburgh and certify as paupers the people who had gathered to meet them, thus entitling them to a small ration of meal each. Several hundred people assembled in Louisburgh but the commissioners failed to appear, having decided to see the people in Delphi Lodge instead. The people set out on their 11 mile walk along mountain road and pathway in driving snow and bitter cold. When they finally did manage to meet the commissioners they were refused either food or tickets of admission to the workhouse and so they began their weary, dispirited return journey. Many – some say hundreds – died along the way, many of whom were buried where they fell.

On May 18th, 2013 people will again assemble in Louisburgh and walk to Delphi Lodge carrying with them the names of those definitely known to have died on the same route in 1849 – Catherine Grady, Mary McHale, James Flynn, Mrs. Dalton and her son and daughter and the Dillon family – as well as the names of people who have died in modern famines throughout the world. This time the gates of Delphi Lodge will open in welcome. Symbols of life, a tree and potatoes (of the non-genetically modified variety), will be planted. Continue reading “Famine Walk 2013: Opening The Gates – Sowing New Seeds” →

Hedge School 2010: Food Sovereignty – Rooting out the Causes of Global Hunger

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Saturday, 23 October 2010, Kimmage DSC, Dublin

The Afri Hedge School 2010 was organised in partnership with Kimmage Development Studies Centre (KDSC) and took place on Saturday, 23 October in Kimmage DSC in Dublin.

The event focused on the fundamental right to food and discussed the importance of food sovereignty as a precondition for food security and tackling world hunger. Introductory talks were given by Alan Matthews, from the Economics Department at Trinity College Dublin, Former UN Assistant Secretary General Denis Halliday, and Clare O’Grady Walshe, who launched her new pamphlet, entitled Seeds of Hope in a World of Insecurity. The pamphlet deals with issues of food insecurity and loss of biodiversity and was edited by Dervla Murphy.

Continue reading “Hedge School 2010: Food Sovereignty – Rooting out the Causes of Global Hunger” →