(France, September 25, 2014) To denounce the imminent signing of CETA and demand a stop to negotiations on TTIP, the Confédération paysanne (2nd largest farmer union in France) occupied yesterday headquarters of Cargill FR, the first food processing multinational in the world.
The hundred activists unfurled a banner of 25m x 10m on the front of the head office, with the following message: “Holland, Juncker, Obama: don’t offer farmers and citizens to multinationals, Stop TTIP /CETA”. They occupied buildings and the trading floor the whole day, until they got an appointment with the office of Secretary of State for French Foreign Trade, Mr. Matthias Fekl.
These agreements are a major threat for french, European and north American agriculture and food. Their conclusions would lead to accelerated destruction of human scale farms, the only ones able to guarantee jobs in rural areas, good food and to preserve the environment.
Inevitably they will be replaced by factories (as the 1000 milk cows factory we’re fighting in France), namely their perfect antithesis. Furthermore, these agreements will strengthen multinationals domination, in law and in facts, over the farmers and citizens around the world. La Confederation paysanne calls for a mass rally to block factory farms and stop free trade agreements and prevent these kind of dynamics that kill alternatives and great projects, especially for food and agriculture.
For your information, 6 unionists (farmers) and 3 activists will be sued before a criminal court October the 28th, in Amiens (north of France) because they’ve participated in civil disobedience actions over one year, to block this industrialization of agriculture. We’ll be thankful if you could send us supports, any kind you could ! (written or video testimonies, donations, etc) in order to face this event and make it a symbol of resistance. Thank you in advance !
