International Fast for Justice at a time of Manufactured Hunger
With the unprecedented rise in food prices causing mass hunger around the world, a coalition of farmer organizations, churches, and social justice organizations in the U.S. and abroad, will be staging a 3-day Fast in Solidarity with the Famished of the World running Thursday evening through Sunday evening, 3 days corresponding to the 3 billion people now living under $2 per day.
Fasting is a powerful spiritual practice with the capacity to transform lives and unjust social structures.
In Louisville, Kentucky people of faith, urban agriculturalists and others will be fasting and holding a press conference at the Mazzoli Federal Building at 11:30 a.m. Friday May 23 to Praise the NO vote by Junior Congressman John Yarmuth on the Peru-US Free Trade agreement, and to affirm efforts by the Community Farm Alliance and Sustainable Agriculture of Louisville and other actors to rebuild the local food economy of the region and to partner to provide healthy locally-produced food to low-income residents of the city. On Saturday morning at the Smoketown Farmers Market at Meyzeek Middle School at 828 S. Jackson Street on Saturday, 9:00 AM - 1:00 PM local farmer Adam Barr will be fasting as he delivers food to the community. And on Sunday May 25 at 6 p.m. at Central Presbyterian Church 318 W. Kentucky Street in the basement meeting room there will be a eucharist and simple meal to break the three-day fast.
In New York City, fasters will join a gathering organized by the Rainforest Action Network (RAN) to protest the egregious behavior of a large agribusiness, Bunge corporation, monopolizing and degrading land and resources for monocultural production of GMO soybeans in Brazil, a big player in profiteering from the food crisis. (andrea@ran.org
Others will continue a rolling fast the last week of May, and in Rome at the meeting of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN, there will be a massive convergence, including fasters, to push for new policies to support the rebuilding of local food economies across the planet.
Farmer spokespersons of the Via Campesina movement will be in Rome from June 1-5, including Dena Hoff of the National Family Farm Coalition (NFFC) of the U.S.
To date organizations participating in fasting, supporting those fasting and/or coordinating in public education efforts about the food crisis include: Agricultural Missions, Inc (AMI), the Community Farm Alliance (CFA), the Kentucky Interfaith Taskforce on Latin America and the Caribbean (KITLAC), the Oakland Institute (OI), the Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA), the National Family Farm Coalition (NFFC), Sustainable Agriculture of Louisville (SAL), World Hunger Year (WHY).
For more information, and to arrange interviews and access background information, please contact Stephen Bartlett, Coordinator for Education and Advocacy, Agricultural Missions, Inc (AMI) at 502 896 9171 sbartlett@ag-missions.org Web: www.agriculturalmissions.org
