The following news item is posted at the website of Agriterra, www.agro-info.net, about the visit of AFA representatives to the Netherlands last February 2008.
Agriterra frequently arranges visits of Dutchmen (and women) to farmers organisations in developing countries, to bring the knowledge and expertise from here to there. But it also happens the other way around. This way the foreign organisations can experience with their own eyes how things are done here. For that reason Esther Penunia from the Asian Farmers Association (AFA) and Crispino Aguelo from Pakisama, both from the Philippines, were in the Netherlands recently. They experienced how Dutch organisations use marketing and how they deal with the concept durability. With their suitcases filled with useful information and interesting experiences they flew back to Asia.
Esther Penunia is secretary-general of AFA. This is a regional alliance of farmer federations and organisations in ten Asian countries, representing 10 million farmers. AFA tries to be a strong lobby and advocacy group for farmers’ rights and development. Further, AFA is a facilitator for their members’ commercial activities in trading and marketing of sustainable agricultural products. The alliance is also a venue for solidarity and exchange of information on agriculture and farmers’ development among it’s members.
One of the nine member organisations of AFA is Pakisama, of which Cripsino Aguelo is the president. Pakisama stands up for the empowerment of the Filipino peasantry by building a strong and credible national peasant federation that leads in the advocacy for and implementation of genuine and sustainable agrarian and aquatic reform and rural development and equality of men and women. smaller farmers, engages in land reformation and sustainable agriculture.
Their visit to some Dutch organisations was combined with other activities in Europe. Penunia and Aguelo both participated in the Farmers Forum in Rome, which was organised by the International Federation of Agricultural Development (IFAD). During this forum agricultural leaders and Ministers of Agriculture of all 164 member countries of the IFAD discussed about several themes.
At the visited Dutch organisations, under which Agriterra, ICCO and Oxfam Novib, was spoken about how AFA and Pakisama could arrange marketing training for their members, how Dutch organisations lobby and what these organisations do in general.
A part of the European program that Penunia and Aguelo will not forget was their visit to a farm in Dijon (France). This visit was scheduled so they could experience how European farmers work. During their stay at the farm a calf was born. The Philippine representatives were honored to name the young animal. The condition was that the name began with a “D”. Penunia and Aguelo gave her the Philippine name Diwata, which means “fairy”. So their visit will linger for some years.
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