Caravan blog 1: First stop - Paris

The Trade to Climate Caravan

Organised by Klimaforum (www.klimaforum09.org)

From the WTO meetings in Geneva to the UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen, the Trade to Climate Caravan is taking the social and climate justice message through Europe, direct to the policy makers.

Activists from social and environmental struggles all over the world have come together to tell the politicians, the lobbyists and the multinationals that we demand system change, not climate change. The caravan has brought together campaigers and activists from throughout the global south; people who are suffering directly as a result of unjust and exploitative trade agreements, environmental devastation including destructive 'environmental' mega projects, and the socially reprehensible behaviour of governments as they resort to violence to evict people from their lands and pave the way or multinational corporations and agribusiness.

So, from Colombia to the Congo, the Phillippines to Mexico, Belarus to South Korea, and India to Peru, southern activists have come together in the run up to the UN Climate Summit to demand that the politicians and corporations stop polluting the poor for profit. This blog is devoted to sharing the messages and stories of those on the caravan as I travel with them to Copenhagen.

First stop: Paris

France's Parisian activists welcomed us with open arms at our first major stop on our journey to Copenhagen.

At a rally in central paris, organised by the Collectif Urgence Climatique, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace and Véloruption, members of the caravan took to the stage to speak of their struggles. We heard testimonies from the Phillippines, Colombia and India amongst others. People spoke of the oppression and violence they faced as a result of short sighted trade agreements, and the impacts of climate change. We heard how, in Colombia, the agroindustry is forcibly taking land and displacing local people in the name of 'development'. The multinationals in Colombia, aided by government paramilitaries, have now displaced a whopping 10 per cent of the indigenous population. Those opposing the multinationals have faced violence and death threats. Only a few days ago, one of the leading members of the indigenous communities was killed for voicing his opposition to the forced expulsions of rural farmers and families from their land.

Hearing such testimonies directly from the mouths of those who are suffering the consequences of corporate exploitation and political repression is certainly a sobering experience. The message from the demonstration was loud and clear: those with the power to do so must put a stop to the policies and corruption which are allowing multi and transnational corporations free reign over people's lives and livelihoods, and simultaneously destroying our environment and climate.

Much of our stay in Paris was spent forging the link between social injustice, climate change, and immigration. In countries where politicians and multinationals are pushing the poorest people into even deeper poverty, these issues are being compounded by climatic changes that are forcing people from their homes. Many of these indigenous peoples end up as climate refugees, often seeking better lives in places such as Europe, the very countries which are the most responsible for the damage that has been wrought on their own land. These refugees and displaced peoples often find themselves in a strange country, where they have no rights, and where they have ended up at the tail end of a system which has ruined their own economies and communities.

As a show of solidarity with those who have been either forcibly evicted from their communities, either through land grabbing multinational or due to the onslaught climate change, the caravan joined the Marche Contre la Précarité, le Chomage et les Licenciements (a demonstration against social instability, unemployment and redundancies). Hundreds of us marched through the capital to demand social and envionmental justice.

We were treated to a fantastic rendition of Congolese and South Korean music thanks to Alphonsene Nguba Ngiengo and Geumsoon Yoon, both of whom are travelling on the caravan, and both of whom took to the microphone to sing traditional songs from their homelands.

At the venue for the Network of Documentation of International Solidarity (RETIMO), we had been invited to hold a joint public meeting with some of the 'sans-papiers' who run the centre. The 'sans-papiers' in France are people who have arrived into the country without official documents - often political or environmental refugees - and who are refused these documents by the French government. This means that, even though they work and live in France, they have no rights to healthcare provision, education or pensions. And this from a country which is often responsible for their evictions in the first place.

We heard testimonies from some of those who have been forced to leave their communities and their countries due to the impacts of climate change. Individuals such as Siso, from Mali, told of how a changing climate had forced them from their land, saying that "the countries that pollute the most have to change. This is required of them by the people of the world". Siso spoke about the impact that drought was having on his village, in an area which once benefitted from the most rainfall in the country. He spoke of how, back when he was a child in 1975, not one person had immigrated from his village. Now, over 200 people have had to leave.

There was a strong feeling of solidarity between the activists on the caravan and those who we met at the centre, many of whom turned out to be from the same countries and victims of the same, or very similar, struggles.

It was a very poignant evening, but despite the obvious sadness shared by all those who had suffered such oppression and violence, the evening ended on a high note, with a 15 piece jazz and ska band treating us to the most fantastic music I've heard for a long while. Those Africans sure know how to dance!

Dharmendra is part of FDI Watch, an Indian organisation which campaigns against new trade laws which would allow multinational corporations into India. At the moment, FDI Watch are heavily involved with campaigning to block Tesco and Walmart from entering the country. He described to me how devastating the impact would be for local people if such global corporations were allowed to gain access to India's markets, as all the millions of people who depend on small scale agriculture and market stalls would never be able to compete with such monolithic entreprises.

FDI Watch is an alliance which stretches across India, and which has so far been successful in blocking Walmart from entering the Indian economy. Yet the campaign also tagrgets the financial institutions such as HSBC which threaten the local economic system on which India is based. HSBC is curretly persuing a policy in India whereby it will only grant bank accounts for the wealthier sectors of the population. This is increasingly putting pressure on the public sector banks which lend to the poor, as the richer customers are changing to HSBC. This will mean less social banking, and more poverty for the poor.

To compound these problems, HSBC has been linked to violence and torture in India. Recently, a customer who fell behind with his repayments was tortured by HSBC officials. He later committed suicide.

Dharmendra is all too aware of both the social and environmental devastation which his country is being submitted to because of the greed of multinational corporations. To deeen the wound, India is also experiencing increasing amounts of extreme weather events, such as floods in areas which have never seen flooding before, which is decreasing rice production and plunging the poor further into poverty. He understands the urgency of the situation, and demands that the politicians do too. As he said to me, "we need success in Copenhagen, or it will be too late for humanity".

by Wiz Baines