Agribusiness

Workers’ Party Demands Respect For Farmers Across Europe

February 2, 2024 Workers' Party Of Belgium, People's Dispatch. Resist! Agribusiness, Belgium, Europe, European Union (EU), Farmers

All across Europe, farmers are making their voices heard. In Belgium too, actions and blockages have been taking place across the country. The movement, which started from the base, is supported by agricultural unions, both in the south and the north of the country. “It is not normal that farmers cannot make a living from their work, we support their mobilization,” declares PTB president Raoul Hedebouw. For the agricultural world, the cup is full and the anger is deep. The reasons for this are numerous. Production costs have increased sharply for farmers in recent years, as have prices for the consumer. However, farmers do not sell their products more expensively.

Smithfield Sued For Misleading Consumers With False Claims Of Superior Safety

May 27, 2020 By Katherine Paul, Organic Consumers Association. Resist! Agribusiness, Factory Farms, Food Safety, Meat

The Organic Consumers Association announced that it has sued Smithfield Foods for falsely advertising Smithfield pork products as the “safest” U.S. pork products. In the complaint, OCA alleges that on numerous occasions, the U.S. Department of Agriculture testing of Smithfield pork has detected pathogens that are “commonly associated with human illness” and resistant to antibiotics. This makes the products far less than the “safest possible” in the U.S., according to OCA. The suit also alleges that many disease strains detected in Smithfield products have been found to be resistant to antibiotics that are designated by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration as “highly important” or even “critically important” for human health. OCA also alleges that Smithfield employs production practices that result in less safe conditions and products, including crowded conditions, the use of potentially carcinogenic drugs and rapid slaughter methods.

Landless Workers Are Challenging Unequal Land Distribution And Corporate Agribusiness

April 13, 2020 Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research. Resist! Agribusiness, Brazil, Land Reform, wealth inequality

Brazil is among the most unequal countries in the world when it comes to land distribution and is home to the world’s biggest landed estates. This structure of land concentration and unproductivity has historic roots dating back to Portuguese colonization, which established a foundation of social inequality in the country that persists today. In Brazil—as elsewhere—the relationship with the land is fundamental for the country’s development. To talk about land is to talk not only about people, but also about the control of natural resources and of economic, social, and cultural development; land is an expression of society as a whole. Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research’s new dossier, “Popular Agrarian Reform and the Struggle for Land in Brazil,” discusses the current stage of the struggle for land in the country.

Days Of Revolt: Company Town

February 14, 2016 Chris Hedges, www.therealnews.com Resistance Report Agribusiness, Big Ag, Food and Agriculture, Worker Rights

By Chris Hedges. Welcome to Days of Revolt. We're filming this segment in New York City, and we're going to be discussing the effects of the agricul--the agricultural corporations, in particular in Salinas, California. What they have done to communities, to grassroots democratic movements, and how in this microcosm of Salinas they are reconfiguring the city along the lines of neoliberalism in a way that, of course, communities and cities across this country are being reconfigured. Joining me in the studio is Jose Castaneda. He is an independent radical city councilperson who big business has made war against. And Anthony Prince, an attorney who has been working with groups in Salinas to fight back against the power of big business, and all the ways that they are distorting life within the city, including of course going after what has become a large homeless population. Thank you, Jose, and thank you, Anthony.

Blow The Whistle On Agribusiness, Ag-Gag Law Unconstitutional

August 7, 2015 Staff, www.centerforfoodsafety.org Resist! Agribusiness, Food and Agriculture, Whistleblowers

By Staff for the Center for Food Safety - Idaho’s Ag-Gag law is unconstitutional, the U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho ruled today, overturning the law. In a landmark victory for a broad-based public interest coalition of national nonprofits, including Center for Food Safety (CFS), the Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALDF), People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Idaho, the court held that the Ag-Gag law, Idaho Code sec. 18-7042, violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. Today’s decision marks the first time a court has declared an Ag-Gag statute unconstitutional. “This is a huge victory for free speech, animal welfare, and food safety. Without the ability to witness and expose the illegal and unethical behavior that goes on in one of the nation’s most powerful industries, we are all vulnerable. This latest ruling affirms our right to report abuse in order to protect animals and our health,” said Paige Tomaselli, senior attorney for Center for Food Safety.

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