Lovely revolutionaries,
After a long, long, long break, the newsletter is FINALLY back, making sure that everyone knows what ASEED is up to!
Even though the newsletter had to take a little break, this doesn’t mean that ASEED didn’t continue being your favourite revolutionary food fighter. We continued with our Fossil Free Agriculture campaign, dismantling colonial, patriarchal, destructive food systems that destroy life!
Enemy nr. 1 remains, of course, YARA, Europe’s biggest nitrogen fertilizer company that is greenwashing their dirty practices more than ever.
In the past year, we have organised benefit dinners, reading groups, film screenings, disruptive actions, and of course, the Food Autonomy Festival. We are looking forward to another year full of exciting activities and are very confident that we will reach our goal to destroy the capitalist food system.
Enjoy reading our newsletter, and we hope to see you soon at one of our upcoming events!
Love & Rage,
the ASEED team
❓ What is the Fossil Free Agriculture campaign ❓
With this campaign, we aim to expose the corporations that profit from the industrial agriculture system. These corporations contribute substantially to the climate crisis and take a disproportionate amount of the wealth. By focusing on the use of fossil fuels in the corporate-controlled industrial food system, we aim to expand the concept of climate justice to include agricultural justice. We do this by connecting the fossil fuel-focused climate movement and the food sovereignty movements, while opening a conversation about the structural links between the agro-industry and the fossil fuel industry, and the major role they play in the escalating climate, ecological and social crises.
What role does the Netherlands play in this? The Netherlands functions as Europe’s most important distribution centre for both fossil fuels and industrial agriculture. The largest factory of the biggest nitrogen fertilizer company in the world (YARA) is located in Sluiskil, Zeeland. To make matters worse, this country hosts a huge and ruthless industrial livestock industry and functions as a European hub for the distribution of genetically modified soy imports. On the political level, the Dutch government is enthusiastically promoting the intensification of industrial food production, harmful and undemocratic trade agreements and risky new GMO techniques. Taking action here, in our own back yard, is clearly both urgently necessary and of strategic importance!
[If you want to learn more about this, read the full story here.]
ASEED is a grassroots and volunteer-based organisation. Would you like to become involved as well? Then feel very welcome to join one of our upcoming events & meetings!
If you would like to know more or join us in the movement to protect our veggies and our planet, check out our website, or just contact us at info@aseed.net!
Join our campaign!
🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱 LOOKING BACK 🌱🌱🌱🌱🌱
Food Autonomy Festival #6:
Sowing Solidarity, Nurturing Resistance, Harvesting Autonomy
Last May we got together in two cities (Amsterdam & Utrecht) to learn practical skills, hear people’s experiences, start building alternatives and share moments of laughter and joy. The festival became a place where activists, farmers, academics, food-lovers (among many others who fight together for social and ecological justice) were brought together. Collectively we tried to take engagement with food beyond procurement and make it a site of resistance, solidarity and autonomy.
[To read more about how Anarchapple and Squarrot experienced the FAF#6, click here and to see photos of the event, click here.]
Stop greenwashing regenerative agriculture!
On the 6th and 7th of September took place the so-called “regenerative” agriculture summit with companies such as YARA, Syngenta, Cargill, Unilever, and Rabobank as main partners.
We denounce the greenwashing of regenerative agriculture by these exploitative companies! [read our statement here.] In protest of this absurd/nonsensical summit, activists disturbed and delayed its start by two hours on the 6th of September. They blocked the main entrance of the hotel and chanted in refusal with this indecency. A banner was hung on the roof of the hotel stating: “fight greenwashing agro-industry for food justice”. During this time, we got the chance to talk to participants of the summit and expose the different arguments of our statement. All activists were arrested and one activist was kept for over two days in custody and sent to immediate trial. Thanks to our amazing lawyer, this activist was cleared and freed from all charges as we should have the right to protest!
Counter-lagoon to resist corporate greenwashing summit in Amsterdam!
Activists, citizens, researchers, and farmers came together to talk about the greenwashing of regenerative agriculture by some of the main partners of the summit, but also to talk about real regenerative agriculture projects, sometimes happening close to us.
Some activists prepared a theatre play that was performed at Oosterpark in which they denounce corporate greed and present regeneration. [Listen to the soundtrack of the performance here.]
Together we came in resistance against the appropriation and greenwashing of “regenerative agriculture” by agribusiness. The agroecology movement will resist and keep on building and feeding alternatives! [read more about it here.]
Anarchist Bookfair Amsterdam
This weekend we are very excited to be one of the 60 different collectives at the Anarchist Bookfair Amsterdam with a stall!!!
We joined workshops, talked with fellow activists and enjoyed the good food and company.
Check out their website and stay tuned for next year!
🌱🌱🌱🌱 UPCOMING EVENTS 🌱🌱🌱🌱
04-05/11/22, 17.00-22.00
[Plantage Doklaan 8-12, 1018CM Amsterdam]
Join our comrades at the 2-day Fiesta to honour the Cacao plant and food, remember ancestral wisdom and celebrate LIFE together!
[For more information and getting tickets click here.]
06/11/22, 11:00-13:00
[De Kweepeer, Bankraspad 14, 1184 TW Amstelveen]
This is going to be the last workshop of the season! We will collect seeds and share lessons about seed preservation for the coming year for this beautiful garden and beyond! Afterwards there will be a potluck lunch. The event is free and you don’t need prior knowledge to attend!
[More information on the website.]
15/11/22
[Plantage Doklaan 8-12, 1018CM Amsterdam]
Come join us for some good food at our Benefit Dinner for the legal fees of a comrade and to hear about what ASEED is planning this year!
(More info will be announced soon.)
If you want to help out at our events, send us an email at info@aseed.net !!!
🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱 🌱
Unfortunately, revolution is not for free…
In order for ASEED to hold meetings, print flyers and posters, and organize infrastructure for the Food Autonomy Festival, we need funding.
If you believe in what we do, please consider donating to support our work, any amount is highly appreciated!
Support us!
