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The RAN agribusiness campaign, together with Student Trade Justice Campaign have organized a U.S. speaking tour for Leticia Galeano, a campesina youth leader from Paraguay. Other co-sponsors include Georgetown University, School of Americas Watch, Institute for Policy Studies, Grassroots International, Across the Americas, World Hunger Year, Global Justice Ecology Project, Small Planet Institute, Witness for Peace Upper Midwest and the Washington Office on Latin America
Leticia Galeano is an inspiring youth leader from the Movimiento Agrario y Popular (a peasant organization in the department of Caaguazú) and student at the Universidad Catolica in Asuncion, Paraguay. Leticia will speak about militarization in Paraguay, and about the role of U.S. agribusiness giants like ADM, Bunge and Cargill in fueling the soybean wars.
Her community, Tekojoja, is an example of organized resistance to agribusiness exploitation. In 2005, the police violently and illegally displaced families from the community, resulting in the deaths of two individuals. There is now an attempt to bring this case before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
The speaking tour will also be an opportunity to learn about the landless movement in Paraguay and about unique stories of community resistance through food sovereignty initiatives based on the concept of agroecology and subsistence farming. Events will be held at universities, cultural centers, and conferences in various cities. Additional speakers will join Leticia at the events.
The tour will officially kick off on Tuesday evening, September 23 at Loyola University in Chicago. We will then travel to Minneapolis, Washington D.C., New York City, Burlington and Philadelphia. For more information about events in individual cities, see below:
- Chicago
- Minneapolis: IATP, Waite House Community Center
- Washington D.C.: Friends of the Earth, Georgetown University
- New York City