Challenging-Agribusiness-And-Building-Alternatives
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CHALLENGING AGRIBUSINESS AND BUILDING ALTERNATIVES IN TUNISIA AND MOROCCO Working Group on Food Sovereignty in Tunisia and ATTAC Maroc Written by: Ghassen ben Khelifa Edited by: Hamza Hamouchene and Sam Harris Cover image: Ali Aznague Based on a translation from Arabic by Marwa Ayadi With the support of: War on Want January 2020 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. OVERVIEW ..................................................................................................... 5 2. FOOD SECURITY OR FOOD SOVEREIGNTY? ............................................... 9 A- Food security ................................................................................... 10 B- Food Sovereignty ............................................................................ 11 3. IMPACT OF THE CURRENT AGRICULTURAL MODEL ON EXPORTS IN TUNISIA AND MOROCCO .............................................................................. 13 A- Tunisia : Mass production for export as a priority ....................... 14 B- Morocco : Prioritising exports at the expense of small farme ....... 19 4. THE RIGHT TO LAND ACCESS AND POLICIES OF LAND GRABBING ........ 25 A- Tunisia ............................................................................................... 26 B- Morocco ............................................................................................ 28 5. WATER RESOURCES: SMALL FARMERS FACE WATER SHORTAGES DUE TO EXPORT CAPITALIST AGRICULTURE ............................................................. 31 A- Tunisia ....................................................................................................... 32 B- Morocco .................................................................................................... 35 6. RESISTANCE AND ALTERNATIVES ON THE HORIZON OF ACHIEVING FOOD SOVEREIGNTY ............................................................................................... 37 A- Tunisia ....................................................................................................... 38 B- Morocco .................................................................................................... 40 1. OVERVIEW The famine and ’bread uprisings’ that southern states to support urban have erupted in the early part of the centres in the north. last decade in many southern areas of Tunisia and Morocco revealed the New systems of dependency and extent of the failures of the global dominance are being forged. A focus food system. Large corporations have on raw materials exportation puts monopolised food production with a food sovereignty at risks in two ways: 3 focus on their own profit where mono- either through rentier regimes that cropping, export to higher paying reinforce food dependency and markets, biofuel production, basic reliance on food imports, like in foodstuff speculation and land grabbing the case of Algeria; or through the are rife. This industrialised agricultural exploitation of land, water and other extraction is having an increasingly resources - mainly for the sake of detrimental impact on already scarce commercial, industrial and export water resources1; as mass production, farming – like in Tunisia and Morocco. mono-cropping and heavy water This development model, which most consumption within arid zones such impacts poor villagers in marginalised as deserts leads to the diminishing of regions, results in serious tensions, valuable, non-renewable groundwater. leading to resistance and protests. Meanwhile the conversion of arable Communities attempt to resist the lands from food production to use for plundering of their mineral resources, energy production (biofuels) and the the seizure of their lands, the severe growing of crops for use in European exploitation of their workforce and the cosmetics such as Jojoba (Simmondsia loss of their livelihoods. However, it is chinensis) in Tunisia can be seen as clear that this form of development virtual water exportation2. is not compatible with transitional This new form of colonialism, driven justice due to its disastrous social and 4 by corporate profit, exploits a food ecological consequences . Meanwhile, system in North Africa and the the situation has worsened in recent Maghreb which itself was the result decades in the aftermath of the neo- of 19th century colonialism when an liberal reconfiguration of the region’s extractive process of accumulation economy and the increase of cross- and seizure was instigated in border capital flows. 1 Study: Extractive pattern and fighting against it in North Africa; Hamza Hamouchene (TNI), November 2019. 2 Allan, J.A. 2003, “Virtual water - the water, food and trade nexus: useful concept or misleading metaphor?” Water International -1 28: 4-11 3 In a Rentier Regime, all or an important portion of a State’s national revenues derive from the rent of local resources to external clients. 4 Gudynas, E. 2013. “Transitions to post-extractivism: directions, options, areas of action.” In Beyond Development: Alternative – 6 Visions from Latin America, edited by M. Lang & D. Mokrani,165-188. Quito & Amsterdam: Rosa Luxemburg Foundation & Transnational Institute. 7 Studies by the Working Group for This report summarises the results, Food Sovereignty in Tunisia5 and shedding light on the struggles and ATTAC Maroc6 about the state of the concerns of small farmers, fishermen agricultural sector in each country and agricultural workers in Morocco focused on small food producers: and Tunisia from a grassroots and small farmers and agricultural social change perspective. workers. These studies confirmed that food access and food production are undeniably political issues. 5 Report: “Our Food, our Agriculture, our Sovereignty”, Working Group for Food Sovereignty, June 2019, Tunis. 6 Report : Pour la Souveraineté Alimentaire au Maroc: étude de terrain sur les politiques agricoles et le pillage des ressources, ATTAC Maroc, October 2019. 8 2. FOOD SECURITY OR FOOD SOVEREIGNTY? Food security and food sovereignty are by each term and address the question defined by multiple layers of economic, of whether small farmers, and we as social and political understanding. In people, should support food security this section we look at what we mean or food sovereignty. A- FOOD SECURITY The concept of food security emerged and depriving people of their during the late 1960s7. It is defined by sovereignty for the purpose of the Food and Agriculture Organization subduing and controlling them. The (FAO) as follows: “Food security exists agricultural production system has when all people, at all times, have witnessed a fundamental change physical and economic access to based on the duality of productivity sufficient, safe and nutritious food and profit. This has led to the loss that meets their dietary needs and not only of livelihoods founded on food preferences for an active and subsistence agriculture, but also healthy life”8. the social and human benefits of self-sufficiency and production, in From this definition, it is clear that favour of so-called ‘agribusiness’. the core of food security is associated This new production pattern is with food provision, without dwelling nothing but a dispossession, seizure on the ways and means to provide it. and subduing mechanism. This This is where the major problem lies: philosophy has direct catastrophic the concept of food security suggests consequences on the national that it is not necessary for a country to and local structures of agricultural produce its basic food needs as long as production, especially on small and importing them from other countries medium-sized farmers, including: would ensure an adequate and secure provision of food9. • Destroying the local agriculture potential by privileging imported Importing food to meet local over locally produced food and needs could be seen as a magical weakening local competition. solution to food problems in As a result, local farmers find the world, and an example of themselves on the brink of solidarity between peoples. In bankruptcy, with some forced to reality, it entails mechanisms quit agricultural work while others aimed at impoverishing, starving attempt to adapt to the workings 7 Ajl, M.; peasantries, food sovereignty and environment; Interview of Habib Ayeb, on 4th March 2018 in Tunis; Observatory of Food Sovereignty and Environment; 2018. 8 http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/faoitaly/documents/pdf/pdf_Food_Security_ Cocept_Note.pdf 9 Colin A.; Food sovereignty, agricultural collective mobilisations and multiple instrumentations of a transnational concept; Revue Tiers Monde, 2011. 10 of the challenging market. resources in order to increase the volume of exports and transactions. • Substituting the local agricultural production pattern, which is • Replacing the national stocks of based on the provision of the local seeds in favour of imported basic needs for local supply, by and genetically modified seeds. other secondary products that are more profitable. • Perpetuating the state of economic dependency, especially • Diverting national agriculture food dependency, through a focus from meeting local needs to reliance on importation and the task of draining local natural global food markets. B- FOOD SOVEREIGNTY The concept of food sovereignty • Prioritising local farming to feed emerged in 1996, coined by the people, and making water, lands, movement of farmers’ during the Food seeds and loans accessible to landless and Agriculture Organization (FAO) farmers. This recognises the need food summit. Food sovereignty was to create