Representatives of a range of small male and female farmers, Adivasis, agricultural laborers, workers, fishworkers, landless people, plantation workers, hawkers and youth organized a caravan across Bangladesh, India and Nepal from November 10-24, 2104 to bring people together for climate justice and peoples solutions to the climate crisis. Our 14 day South Asian Climate Justice, Gender and Food Sovereignty Caravan, was organized by the Bangladesh Krishok Federation (BKF); Bangladesh Kishani Sabha, Friends of Bangladesh and All Nepal Peasant’s Federation and included these movements as well as the Bangladesh Adivasi Samiti, Bangladesh Agricultural Farm Labor Federation, EKOTTRO, National Hawkers’ Federation, Progressive Plantation Workers’ Union, All Nepal Women’s Association, MONLAR, and La Via Campesina all of which are peoples movements struggling for dignity and the rights of rural and working people. We visited 12 towns and cities of Bangladesh, India and Nepal. We were joined by many in the same struggle from our sister peasant organisations of India; Sri Lanka; Nepal, Indonesia and the Philippines; as well as allies and supporters of our struggles from the U.K.; U.S., Germany, Sweden and Australia. Our Caravan culminated in a three day ’People’s SAARC’ held in Kathmandu, Nepal. This was in response to the official SAARC (South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation) meeting that was being held in Nepal’s capital at the same time. At the People’s SAARC movements came together to discuss alternative solutions to the climate crisis and held demonstrations demanding climate justice.

Following the inaugural meeting of the caravan held in Dhaka, Bangladesh and attended by over 300 people, we held meetings, workshops and seminars on the key issues facing our communities in the various towns and cities along the Caravan’s route. At Gajipur district, caravan participants, including those from the BKF and Pesticide Action Network, met with researchers at the Bangladesh Rice Research Institute to discuss the importance of local varieties of seeds and peasant production in agriculture, while providing critiques of the introduction of GMOs (in particular Bt. Brinjal) into Bangladeshi agriculture. In Madhupur, Tangail a seminar on agro-ecology as a grassroots solution to climate change was held with 170 participants at the Bangladesh Agricultural Development Corporation. Caravan participants visited solar water pump and seed processing facilities and had productive meetings with agricultural farm laborers and organic pineapple tillers. In Iswardi, Pabna a seminar on renewable energy and zero waste took place at the Sugarcane Research Institute where 165 people participated. In particular a range of grassroots energy solutions to energy insecurity were discussed including solar power, windmill, bio-gas, small hydro-electric power generation, charcoal, and limited scale geo-thermal power generation.

In Sadhuhati, Jhenaidah a seminar was held with the participation of local communities on climate change, climate migrants, grassroots adaptation and mitigation. There were 300 participants in the seminar, and it was recognized that South Asian governments needed to attend to the growing problem and precariousness of climate refugees and that these governments should press the advanced capitalist countries for reparations for the ecological debt caused through centuries of greenhouse gas emissions. The Caravan also visited the Cotton Research and Seed Multiplication Farm at Jagadishpur in Chaugachha, Jessore where participants held a seminar on grassroots networking in South Asia that brought together caravan participants, members of the research institute, and three local non-government organizations discussed the importance of climate justice as a grassroots response to build solidarity in the face of climate change.

During the week in Bangladesh the Caravan had travelled around 850 kilometers, through 10 districts, and visited six destinations. Throughout the caravan a prepared leaf-let and caravan booklet that detailed the problems associated with climate change and how grassroots communities were responding to the challenge, were distributed among the local people in order to raise awareness about the objectives of the caravan and the issue of climate change.

The Caravan then visited Kolkata, India where a thousand person strong meeting was held with the National Hawkers’ Federation (and their leader Shaktiman Gosh) about common issues concerning livelihoods and climate change. Following this, a meeting was held with activists in the Informal Sector Labor Action Alliance (Asangathito Khethra Sramik Sangram Manch). In addition, the Caravan held its own evaluation meetings in order for feedback about the process of the caravan. The Caravan then made its way to the India-Nepal border, where all participants entered Nepal except 18 Bangladeshi participants who did not have the Nepali visa in their passport. Because of new circular of the Indian authority the immigration advised them to fly as there is no legal barrier for this. Finally 8 persons out of 18 decided to fly to Kathmandu, although 7 of these were ultimate prevented from flying to Kathmandu by immigration authorities. The remaining 10 decided to go back to Bangladesh. This situation made it all the more apparent that a visa-free South Asia is an urgent requirement.

In Nepal, a seminar was held in Kakarvitta, on Climate Change and Food Sovereignty. Dr. Keshab Khadka conducted the meeting while the ANPFA Vice-President presided over the seminar which was attended by over 50 people. On the same day, the caravan arrived in Sharlahi, Kalikapur, where local people, including the mothers’ community gave the Caravan a traditional reception. Following this, Caravan participants visited a dairy farm producing bio-fertilizers and bio-pesticides. The caravan then made it to Kathmandu where participants were based at the National Agricultural Research Centre.

The Caravan commenced with a people’s march to the venue where the gathering of civil society organizations was taking place for the inaugural function of the People’s SAARC. Badrul Alam as the leader of the climate caravan was one of the panel speakers in the inaugural where Nepal’s Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister Bam Dev Goutam was also present.

Through this caravan it became clear to us that our problems are shared by our brother and sister farmers in South Asia and across the world. These are dominated by the planetary emergency created by the climate crisis. Our very existence is becoming precarious through landlessness; land grabbing by elites; local government corruption; gender inequality and discrimination (especially women’s dual labor in the household and in the fields), and the imposition of industrial market-based agricultural methods (including the use of chemical pesticides and fertilizers) which have increased our production costs and debts and forced peasants from their lands and livelihoods.

The most striking finding of the caravan was that the conditions faced by peasants in Bangladesh, India and Nepal concerning land, food production and livelihood; the impacts of industrialized agriculture; the challenges of climate change, and the oppressions associated with gender were similar and also shared by communities in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and the Philippines. These issues were interwoven with one another in various ways from place to place, but were always present in people’s lives. For example, it was apparent that climate change is aggravating such problems and also making farming difficult due to flooding; salt water inundation; cyclone damage; desertification and drought; and unseasonal and unpredictable weather.

There were several positive outcomes from the Caravan. First, the Caravan created an environment in which dialogues were conducted between caravan participants and landless peasants, Hawkers, agricultural laborers, youth, Adivasis, government officials and research institute staff in which people shared experiences in both directions. It was felt that the caravan had provided an important teaching environment with which to create awareness amongst communities in Bangladesh, India and Nepal about the threats posed to peasant agriculture by agro-business and climate change, the importance of food sovereignty practices, and how gender relationships shape all aspects of peasant life. Second, the Caravan provided a rich opportunity for activists to share experiences from their different movements’ struggles and national contexts; explore how they might create longer term solidarities, and joint campaigns with other movements, and take their experiences back to their own countries and struggles. This also enabled further development of international solidarity between Caravan participants from different struggles and between movements in Bangladesh, India and Nepal. Third, the impact of the caravan on local communities was significant. For example, the presence in communities of activists from other South Asian countries and from countries in the Global North, was important in that it showed that the problems of those communities was of concern to others, and that the voices from the community were valued.

The caravan had a great impact on people because as climate justice, food sovereignty and gender were discussed, people were able to learn a great deal about the central issues of the caravan. These discussions increased the technical knowledge and depth of understanding of the communities.

Finally, the Caravan produced a declaration that was presented to the people’s SAARC and also sent to the UNFCCC meeting in Lima, Peru, and to a range of climate justice networks such as Climate Justice Now! and farmers’ networks such as La Via Campesina.

BKF