View From Casita Colibrí

When “progress” isn’t progress; another thought provoking article that discusses what NAFTA hath wrought…

After NAFTA, Mexican farmers sow uncertainty
by:  Mike Wold

Agribusiness and US policy clash with Campesino culture

The donkeys began to sing to each other as it got dark — starting with a honking bray from one far down in the bottom of the valley, then another answering from up on the hillside, then a third from a little way down the dirt road running by Eleazar García’s house. The road itself was empty by now; even earlier it couldn’t have been called busy — a group of schoolgirls in their white uniforms; a pickup truck with empty burlap sacks in the back; a battered van bringing farmers back from Nochixtlán, the market town two hours away.  I’d been in rural Mexico before but never had a chance to watch the light change as the sun sank below the western hills.

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Supporting small farming in Mexico is a win-win scenario for both the U.S. and Mexico.  But instead, the U.S. has successfully pushed Mexico into an export-oriented agricultural model that assumes depopulation in the rural areas, as large agribusiness replaces small-scale farmers in places like Oaxaca. Many of the displaced farmers will, as a matter of course, migrate north to work in maquiladoras (manufacturing operations) on the border or they will cross to the United States. In other words, the development model the two governments have adopted makes migration inevitable. 

There’s no profit for corporations in helping people stay on the land, where they’re insulated from the ups and downs of the world economy. But, as García put it: “If you really want to combat hunger in the world, it’s in the hands of campesinos. They live on what they grow. It’s important that people begin to understand that.”  [Full article]