Nomadic and transhumant pastoralists face growing threats to their territories, water resources and traditional grazing routes. Land grabbing, privatisation of common lands, restrictive borders and policies that undermine pastoral mobility threaten their livelihoods, cultural practices and ways of life. These challenges also put at risk their vital contribution to biodiversity conservation, sustainable land management and resilient food systems.

UNDROP provides an essential framework to address these challenges. As the only international instrument explicitly recognising the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas, it affirms the rights of pastoralists to land and natural resources, food sovereignty, participation in decision-making and the preservation of their traditional knowledge and practices. The factsheet explores how UNDROP can be mobilised to strengthen their struggles and advance the recognition and protection of mobile Indigenous peoples’ rights.

La entrada New Factsheet on the Rights of Mobile Indigenous Peoples and Pastoralists: UNDROP as a legal and political leverage se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

The report points to extreme territorial inequality: 85 per cent of agricultural holdings are smaller than two hectares but control only 9 per cent of cultivable land, while the largest 0.1 per cent control more than half. Dispossession also affects fisheries, pastoral territories and areas targeted by climate, conservation and renewable-energy projects, as well as communities affected by conflict and displacement.

The report calls for stronger, binding measures to protect territorial rights, including legal recognition of collective and customary territories, restitution and compensation for dispossession, and stronger rights for rural women. It also recommends limits on land and water concentration, agrarian reform and redistribution, legally binding human-rights instruments to regulate business enterprises, and meaningful consultation and, free, prior and informed consent for development and climate-related projects.

Read the full report below:

La entrada New Report by the UN Working Group on UNDROP on territorialities of land and sea se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

La Via Campesina releases its position document on wars around the world, in the framework of the 30th anniversary of the International Day of Peasant Struggles.

Bagnolet, April 17, 2026 | Today marks 30 years since the Eldorado dos Carajás massacre, a tragic event that became a milestone within La Vía Campesina, where landless peasants in Brazil were killed by federal police for defending their right to agrarian reform. Kilometers away and 30 years after what happened, the world continues to bleed innocent peoples and families in an increasingly critical scenario marked by the pressure of imperial power and geopolitical tensions.

Commemorating the International Day of Peasant Struggles, our movement presents the position document: Food Sovereignty in the Face of War, Imperialism, and the Hunger of Peoples Around the World, a document that addresses key elements to understand the impact of wars and imperial power on the food sovereignty of peoples. The document has considered important figures provided by reports from the FAO Committee on Fisheries through its report on The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI), the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), among others, regarding global conflicts and their impacts on food systems in affected countries.

“We are living in an era of unprecedented convergence of crises. Never in recent history have so many armed conflicts erupted simultaneously across so many continents. The wars in Gaza, Lebanon, Mali, Ukraine, Sudan, Yemen, Myanmar, the Sahel, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Syria are not isolated tragedies. They are symptomatic eruptions of a single structurally ill global system, built on the logic of endless capital accumulation, structural racism, escalating geopolitical power tensions, resource extraction, and imperial neo-colonialist domination.”

La Via Campesina, as a movement where peasant organizations converge at the global level, has reflected on this and has constantly denounced the use of hunger as a weapon of war and the business behind it. With destruction and military occupation, the economies of the United States, Israel, and many countries of the Global North benefit; promoting ongoing genocides and carrying out an incalculable number of human rights violations and crimes against humanity, at risk of going unpunished, where women and children are the most vulnerable.

We invite our member organizations and allied organizations to study and share the document as a popular educational tool and as a contribution from the global peasantry in its own voice.

United against imperialism, neocolonialism, the criminalization of our struggles, and the dispossession of our territories!

La entrada Food Sovereignty in the Face of War, Imperialism, and the Hunger of Peoples Around the World se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

The Network of Rural Women of Ecuador has set out to analyze the realities affecting life in their territories in light of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP). This declaration constitutes a substantive tool for rural women, as it guarantees fundamental rights that enable adequate conditions to sustain a dignified life in the territories where they care for and nurture life. Having this instrument is particularly essential in the current adverse context the country is facing.

The paid and unpaid work that rural women perform creates the necessary conditions for human life, nature, and organizational capacity to continue reproducing. Consequently, when they fully exercise the rights recognized in UNDROP and in the Constitution of the Republic of Ecuador (CRE), and have the dignity conditions required, that dignity is also extended to the spaces in which they operate daily. Rural women are pathbreakers; through their work “plowing the land,” in multiple ways, they make it possible for life to persist and continue flourishing in their environments, even amid structural and situational adversities. For this reason, it is imperative that they be recognized as subjects of special protection: rural women must be fully recognized as rights holders.

This report was prepared by the Network of Rural Women of Ecuador through a collective and participatory process, with the aim of making visible and denouncing the violations they face. It is an exercise in naming, denouncing, and amplifying commonly silenced violences, as well as creating spaces for strengthening, reflection, and organizational unity. Based on their voices, knowledge, and experiences, rural women prioritized the analysis of four rights enshrined in UNDROP that are severely affected and compromise their capacity for subsistence: 1) land and territory; 2) adequate food and nutrition; 3) non-discrimination; and 4) environment and water.

The document is structured in four sections: first, a brief contextual analysis; second, an argument regarding the binding nature of UNDROP within the framework of the CRE; third, an examination of the four prioritized rights, including a contextualization of their situation and an analysis of the applicable legal framework in UNDROP and the CRE; and finally, a set of recommendations directed to the Ecuadorian State.

Organizations from the Network of Rural Women of Ecuador participated in the preparation of this report, with the support of FIAN Ecuador in facilitating and systematizing the process.

Full report (Spanish only):

La entrada Rural Women as Rights Holders: UNDROP from the Perspective of Those Who Safeguard Life se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

In this publication, Christophe Golay presents examples of good practices in the promotion and monitoring of UNDROP by social movements and civil society organizations in Southern Africa, Kenya, Burkina Faso and Nepal. These examples, which are key achievements of the RAISE project between 2022 and 2025, should be replicated in many other countries and regions to support UNDROP’s implementation.

La entrada Research Brief: The Role of Social Movements and Civil Society Organizations in the Promotion and Monitoring of UNDROP se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

The Working Group on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas has issued a briefing paper on peasants’ right to seed, in connection with the Eleventh Session of the Governing Body of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA), held from 24 to 29 November 2025 in Lima, Peru.

It provides an overview of key issues on the agenda, including Farmers’ Rights under Article 9 of the Treaty, the functioning of the Multilateral System, digital sequence information, and benefit-sharing arrangements. ​

The paper shows how peasants’ and Indigenous Peoples’ seed systems relate to binding human rights obligations recognized in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP), with particular attention to the right to seeds in Article 19.

It summarizes the Working Group’s main recommendations to GB‑11, such as recognizing the collective nature of peasants’ rights, reviewing national seed and intellectual property laws, addressing digital biopiracy, establishing a standing committee on Farmers’ Rights, and reframing benefit-sharing so that it strengthens community-led seed systems and agrobiodiversity conservation.

La entrada Peasants’ right to seed – Briefing paper by the Working Group on peasants and other people working in rural areas se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

As social movements mobilize toward Climate COP 30 and the Second International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development, this edition of the Nyéléni Newsletter highlights the centrality of land and territories in shaping just and sustainable futures.

Read it here:

La entrada Nyeleni Newsletter n°61 – Rooted in resistance: territories for climate justice se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

This publication is a joint work of Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa, Association for Plant Breeding for the Benefit of Society, Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung, Southeast Asia Regional Initiatives for Community Empowerment, SWISSAID.

Seeds are at the hearts of peasants’ identity and struggles. With UNDROP article 19, it is now a recognized right. We are grateful to re-publish here this important publication on the state of seeds in the world.

“This dossier grapples with the potential and significance of seeds and their foundational role in our food systems. If we want to transform food systems, we must first change how we perceive and interact with seeds. Farmers and activists who defend farmers’ rights are exposed to a variety of threats and their work is often criminalized. This dossier is dedicated to them – and to all who work tirelessly to protect farmers’ seeds and defend seed sovereignty.“

La entrada Seeds at risk se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

On September 16, the European Coordination Via Campesina (ECVC) published a report on the implementation of UNDROP in Europe. You can find the launch press release here.

This new publication presents the Declaration: its origin, purpose, content and how it should be implemented. It lists policy recommendations for international and regional organizations, European decision-makers and national and local authorities.

The main requests are as follows:

• States and international and regional organizations must provide resources (including financial) to support the Working Group.
• The EU must ensure that all its legislation and policies on agriculture are in line with UNDROP. ECVC has already drawn up specific policy proposals on how to ensure this compliance concerning: seeds, a proposed directive on land, agricultural market policy and CAP social conditionality.
• When implementing international policies linked to food and agriculture, the EU must respect and ensure the coherence with UNDROP.
• In accordance with Article 10 of UNDROP, ECVC, as the only European peasant organization, must be systematically consulted by all EU institutions dealing with agriculture.
• The EC’s Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development (DG AGRI) should create a specific sub-unit responsible for peasants’ rights and human rights in agriculture.
• The EU should conduct an independent study to assess the level of coherence of EU legislation and policies with UNDROP.
• When implementing the EU directive on corporate due diligence, EU member states must include UNDROP.
• States must draw up national action plans and national committees for family farming, as called for under the UN Decade for Family Farming. These plans must put the implementation of UNDROP at the center, and promote a broader concept of family farming that goes beyond cis-heterocentric patriarchy, embracing chosen families, a diversity of people and ways of living and working, as well as all kinds of small-scale artisanal food producers.

La entrada How to implement the UNDROP at the European and national level to promote peasants’ rights – publication and video se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

We are pleased to announce the publication of a new Research Brief authored by Dr. Christophe Golay, which examines the role of the United Nations (UN) Working Group (WG) on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas.

This Research Brief is available in English, French and Spanish. It is part of our project on the rights of peasants.

The UN WG on UNDROP as a Catalyst for Promoting and Protecting Peasants’ Rights

In October 2023, the Human Rights Council created the Working Group on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas, composed of 5 independent experts. The Working Group started its activities in May 2024.

The Working Group is mandated to promote the UN Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP) adopted in 2018, to identify gaps in its implementation, to disseminate good practices, to facilitate exchanges and international cooperation, and to report to the Human Rights Council and to the General Assembly.

The Working Group is mandated to collaborate with States, UNDROP’s rights holders and their representative organizations, specialized agencies, funds, programmes, bodies and organizations of the UN system, international, regional and national human rights mechanisms, international and regional organizations, civil society and academia.

The Working Group can act as a catalyst for UNDROP, by providing visibility and support to advance the promotion and protection of the rights enshrined in the Declaration, by clarifying the implications of the Declaration, by identifying key challenges to its implementation, and by recommending concrete measures to be adopted by States and other actors.

Collaboration with Fastenaktion/Action de Carême and RAISE

This Research Brief is published with Fastenaktion/Action de Carême and RAISE. The project Rights-based and Agroecological Initiatives for Sustainability and Equity in Peasant Communities (RAISE) was launched in 2022, with support from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC). It promotes the agroecological transition and UNDROP’s implementation in India, Nepal, Kenya, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso and South Africa. Fastenaktion/Action de Carême is coordinating this project, in collaboration with Rural Women Assembly, Vétérinaires Sans Frontières Switzerland, DKA Austria, Center for Minority Rights Development, Reseau Billital Marobee and the Social Work Institute. The Geneva Academy is a strategic partner in this project.

La entrada The United Nations Working Group on the Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

Carbon markets vs. peasant autonomy: UNDROP’s role in safeguarding rights and data sovereignty

There is an urgent need to rapidly phase out fossil fuels to reduce the devastating impacts of the climate catastrophe. Carbon market mechanisms, such as those recently pushed through by the COP29 presidency, are false solutions and a dangerous distraction from States fulfilling their obligations to reduce emissions and address the root causes of climate change.

Increasingly, carbon trading projects concern agricultural areas and directly involve peasants and other small-scale food producers. A recent report by FIAN International and MAELA Colombia explores the complexities and risks associated with carbon markets, particularly their impact on small-scale food producers. Carbon markets, increasingly adopted by governments and corporations as a response to climate change, have drawn criticism due to their questionable environmental benefits and potential to harm the human rights of rural communities.

These concerns are particularly relevant in Colombia, where a lack of regulatory frameworks puts Indigenous Peoples, Afro-Colombians, and peasant communities at risk.

One key example developed in the report is the Asómbrate project, which aims to integrate Colombian smallholder farmers into global carbon markets. Although marketed as a way to boost farmers’ income through agroforestry and carbon trading via Rabobank’s ACORN digital platform, participants have raised concerns. These include lack of transparency, potential negative environmental impacts, and the erosion of small farmers’ autonomy.

The report stresses that carbon markets rely on complex, data-driven technologies—such as remote sensing and artificial intelligence—which add opacity to the system and exacerbate power imbalances. This trend represents a troubling shift towards the financialization of nature, turning ecosystems into tradeable assets and undermining local, community-led models of sustainability.

The implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP) plays a pivotal role in addressing these concerns. Colombia is obligated under international law to protect the rights of these communities, particularly their autonomy over farming practices and control over their own data. The report urges Colombia to implement stronger legal frameworks that safeguard these rights, calling for participatory processes to ensure fair and sustainable carbon market practices.

Furthermore, international institutions are encouraged to develop comprehensive guidelines to ensure carbon markets respect human rights, especially for Indigenous Peoples and rural communities. By centering policies around human rights frameworks like UNDROP, a more just transition towards sustainable food systems and climate action can be achieved.

Read the report

La entrada Coffee and carbon in Colombia: Human rights concerns at the intersection of food systems, climate change and data-based technologies se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.

La entrada FAO’s work on the themes of the United Nations Declarationon the Rights of Peasantsand Other People Workingin Rural Areas (UNDROP) se publicó primero en Defending Peasants' Rights.