International financial and trade institutions have taken over the decision-making processes, imposing policies that undermine regional and national food sovereignty.

This is why the Civil Society´s alternative Forum to the UN Food Summit which will begin on November 13th in Rome, Italy, has identified as one of the issues to be addressed who the ones making food and agriculture decisions are.

Maryam Rahmanian, from Cenesta organization, was interviewed by Real World Radio. She highlighted that the event will prove that social movements and organizations have the right to participate and state their opinion on this crucial discussion for human kind.

The Iranian activist also stressed the role of some Latin American governments in the official Summit, in terms of defending the rights of peasant movements and the civil society to be heard, and that their opinions be taken into account when it comes to food and agriculture.

“Food crisis is a crisis of who makes the decision about food and agricultural policies”, said the Iranian activist. “It´s not appropriate for the WTO, the IMF and even Bill Gates to be deciding what kind of agricultural policies we need, because these institutions are themselves part of the problem”, stated Maryam Rahmanian.

The activities of the Forum will begin on November 13th, with a celebration in Campidoglio hill where the different peasant and indigenous delegates from all parts of the world will receive the blessing of Mother Earth to their struggle.

In another part of the interview, Maryam made reference to the Food Sovereignty policies in her country, and said that the strong anti-imperialist rhetoric of the Iranian government is not reflected on the domestic policies related to food production, which are more and more dependent and even aligned with the ideas promoted by the WTO.

While Food Sovereignty has been part of the basis of the Islamic Revolution in Iran thirty years ago, “in the past few years it has become less and less important.” She also discussed the issue of rice production, with import tariffs being reduced from140 per cent to 0 per cent, causing rice farmers to be “completely bankrupt”. According to Maryam, another example of the lack of protection to local production has been cotton.

“Even though we are not members of the World Trade Organization, the government has tried at least twenty times to be member, and each time this is blocked by the US”, she stated.

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