“The whole agenda about the green economy, which means that every part of nature, every part of living systems is being commodified to be bought and sold, is a tremendous violation on many levels”, Nettie Wiebe, representative of the National Farmers’ Union of Canada, said on Saturday in the opening ceremony of the La Vía Campesina’s 3rd Youth International Assembly in Jakarta, Indonesia.

“It’s a manipulation and a kind of violence, and that same kind of violence, controlling nature and making it do what we want it to regardless of the consequences, also expresses itself socially. One example is through militarization but also, I wanted to mention in particular, through the oppression of women...”, expressed Wiebe, one of the people chosen to analyse the challenges the world faces today as a representative of peasant and small-scale.

“We are living a time of violence against women and the oppression of women is one of the biggest social problems we face. And that, my young friends, that is my hope : that you will not fall into this kind of violence and gender oppression. That you in fact will reorient yourselves to take a stand against this kind of violence, violence against nature and also against women. That you will not accept it, you will not perpetrate it, and indeed you will transform society in a way that allows equality and respect for both genders”, Wiebe added.