NOVEMBER 25 –
INTERNATIONAL DAY TO ELIMINATE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
Hunger and poverty – these are forms of violence. To be pushed away from
your land you have lived on, and worked on for decades, even for
generations, to give way to business and commercial interest; to be forced
to leave your family and community to find work in a vulnerable situation;
to have no choice but to remain in your work as cheap labour, suffering
inhumane labour condition. These are forms of violence against women.
519 million people of the 800 million hungry all over the world are from our
region. Majority of this are women and girl-children.
This is what 10 years of World Trade Organisation (WTO) trade regime has
brought us – more hunger, less natural resources; more conflicts, less
peace.
Under WTO, our governments opened our economy and natural resources even
more to large commercial interests. Everything now is for profit – our
land, our seas, our forests, our labour, our bodies.
On November 25, the International Day to Eliminate Violence Against Women,
let us bring to public attention the different forms of violence against
women, particularly hunger and poverty, which provide the condition for more
vulnerabilities and violence.
Let us take our governments to task for allowing, and worst, for profiting
from these acts of violence against us.
Let us add our voice to the intensifying call for the dismantling of WTO.
On November 25, let our voices be heard through different forms – public
discussion, flyers, press release, demonstrations . . . Let us be united in
our political calls -
Stop Violence Against Women.
Don’t Globalise Hunger. Assert Women’s Right to Food and Land.
WTO out of our lives!
----
share with us your plans, your stories, and materials. pass them on to –
judyp@apwld.org,
asha@apwld.org and we will post them on our website –
www.dontglobalisehunger.org