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(♪♪ In the land that exists behind of my eyes♪) Agricultural strike, Boyacá, 2013
"Territory doesn´t just refer to a piece of land,
it can´t be defined with just one word.
It has to do with the place where corn grows
where we are born, where we get married,where we give birth to our children
it has to do with the woods, with the animals, with the sacred places, the caves, the lakes, the hills. The territory is us, the people."
The territory beyond the strike
In May 2012 Colombia signed a Free Trade Agreement with the United States;
the terms of this agreement apply directly to the natural resources of the Colombian countryside
The province of Boyacá, one of the most predominantly agricultural provinces in the country,
soon suffered the consequences of the agreement signed.
Today, a year after the agreement was signed, the consequences are evident.
Roads blocked, strikes in several provinces, clashes with the armed forces,
food shortages, closed stores,fuel shortages, anxiety, mass demonstrations and widespread outrage.
One of the main points in the list of demands presented by the representatives of the agricultural
strike asks for a reduction in the price of fertilizers, herbicides, and crop enhancers,used in farming.
But, what could be the consequences for communities, animals, water, seeds, plants and soil of reaching an agreement to reduce the prices of these products?
Why does the national government prioritize this point as a solution to a crisis generatedby the agricultural sector strike?
(Colombian president voice) "We are going to reduce the import duties
of supplies, fertilizers and pesticides, reduce their tax to zero, we are going to impose
a sort of limited freedom on the import duties."
To reduce the duties on these products means
that food growers will have easier access to fungicides, herbicides, synthetic fertilizers and pesticides
made and distributed by multinational companies such as Monsanto, DuPont and Syngenta
that are direct beneficiaries of the signing of the Free Trade Agreement.
What kind of products do you use on the potato crop?
Manzate, Curzate, to stop it getting spoiled we use Furadan, Lorsban,
Triple 15, Abocol
Ditane, Manzate, Gramozone, Glifosato
Many of these pests from other countries, such as the Guatemalan potato moth weren't here before
before they started importing we were free of the Guatemalan moth,
but they brought imports in and that's how we got all these pests.
My dad started spraying with chemicals about 40 years ago, that was around the time when the pests started appearing
When it's windy and we are spraying the plants
everything goes straight to your nose and that affects you.
Illnesses such as lung cancer... the doctor says that we get sick because we don't protect ourselves
enough when we are spraying the plants, but even if you do cover yourself everything goes straight to your nose
What do you mean your skin melts away?
Yes,it's like your skin peels off.
I worked on a big farm and 15 people got poisoned.
What do you mean poisoned?
They were spraying the fields and just the smell of that liquid was enough to make you feel dizzy and they ended up in hospital.
Agrochemicals are highly toxic poisons. Reducing the prices for these products puts at risk the health of farmers in the countryside
as well as the health of consumers in the cities
It threatens the water, the air, and hundreds of species of flora and fauna
The short-term measures designed to solve the crisis end up aggravating the situation,
urges us to find a proper response, a development model from the ancestral knowledge consistent with our land and our history.
There is a growing influence of transnational agribusiness intervening in legislative and economic measures
favoring them and leaving the country over domestic producers
The country needs a revolution, but not an armed one
not a revolution of people who oppose each other or blame each other.
The first revolution is born in the heart and in each conscious individual's actions,
In what we eat, what we do, what we dedice to buy or not
In each action we do, there is the real change
otherwise any attempt of struggle will be lost before it commences.
This video is dedicated to the waters, mountains,caves, lakes, sacred places, plants and animals that live inside each of you.