Featuring Ana Terra and Josiane dos Santos. Fall 2024

Abstract:

Ana Terra Reis is Brazil’s Secretary for Food Sovereignty, Cooperativism, and Supply within the Ministry of Agrarian Development and Family Agriculture. Josiane, also with the Ministry, coordinates policies related to productive chains and brings direct experience from agrarian reform settlements. Their joint talk explores how Brazil’s grassroots agrarian and environmental movements reshape the national agenda around food sovereignty, rural justice, and territorial rights. Drawing from their institutional roles and personal histories in the movements for food sovereignty, both speakers emphasize the historical roots of inequality in Brazil’s plantation-based agrarian model and how agroecological and cooperative alternatives challenge this legacy. The presentation highlights how smallholder farmers, Indigenous peoples, and Quilombola communities have organized around agroecology—not simply as a farming method, but as a political-ecological strategy for autonomy and environmental justice. These movements, often excluded from formal markets, rely on local innovation, cooperative governance, and public support to build sustainable food systems. The role of state programs such as the Food Acquisition Program (PAA) and the National School Feeding Program (PNAE) is recognized as central to linking production and social justice, though both speakers caution against the fragility of these gains in shifting political contexts. Climate change, gender justice, and generational renewal are also foregrounded. Women and youth are presented as key actors in preserving seeds, knowledge, and rural continuity, while the lack of appropriate mechanization and rural infrastructure remains a major challenge. The talk also critiques so-called “green transitions” in energy, warning against reproducing extractive logics under new guises that displace traditional communities and food production. They present the Movimento dos Sem Terra (MST) – Landless workers movement as a concrete example of scaled alternatives, with its nationwide presence and integrated strategies across agroindustry, seed banking, and education. Both Ana and Josiane argue that food sovereignty and environmental justice are inseparable, and that grassroots initiatives offer not only resistance to injustice but blueprints for systemic change.

Historical Roots of Inequality and the Agrarian Question:

Brazil’s deep social and environmental inequalities are rooted in the colonial model of land occupation and exploitation, which continues to shape the country’s agrarian structure. From its inception as a colony, Brazil was inserted into the global economy through a violent plantation system based on slave labor, monoculture, and export-oriented production. This structure was not only economically exclusionary but also ecologically destructive, systematically devaluing local ecosystems and traditional livelihoods. Ana Terra Reis, currently serving as Secretary for Food Sovereignty, Cooperativism, and Supply in Brazil’s Ministry of Agrarian Development and Family Agriculture, highlights how this legacy persists. “The dominant production model in Brazil is still based on export-oriented monocultures, large estates, intensive use of agrochemicals, and the overexploitation of labor.” Today, a handful of export-oriented commodities — soy, corn, sugarcane, oranges, and wood pulp — dominate agricultural production, consuming vast quantities of water and agrochemicals, and reinforcing land concentration. These products are cultivated primarily to meet global demand, not to feed the Brazilian population. Yet, paradoxically, Brazil remains home to millions of people facing food insecurity. Despite the concentration of land and resources, the country’s small-scale farmers, who occupy only 23% of arable land, are responsible for over 70% of the food consumed domestically. Their continued struggle for recognition and access to land is framed by the Brazilian Constitution, which enshrines the social function of property. However, enforcement of land reform and territorial rights remains slow and contested, particularly in the face of escalating land conflicts, disputes over recognition of traditional territories, and the advance of agribusiness into protected or communal lands. These dynamics reflect Brazil’s integration into a globalized, commodity-based economy, in which land is treated as an asset for speculative and extractive interests, often at the expense of local communities and ecosystems.

Resistance, Agroecology, and Grassroots Organization:

In the face of centuries of dispossession, Brazil’s grassroots movements have generated powerful forms of resistance. From Indigenous peoples and Quilombola communities to the Landless Workers’ Movement (MST), these groups have developed territorial practices that defy the extractivist logic of agribusiness. They organize not only to reclaim territories but to rebuild food systems grounded in sovereignty, agroecology, and social justice. Ana emphasized her own background as an agronomist and geographer who has long worked with cooperatives connected to the MST. Her perspective is both technical and rooted in on-the-ground experience. She underscored that the hegemonic model of production in Brazil still operates within a logic based on large-scale plantations, export-driven, monocultural, and dependent on labor overexploitation and environmental degradation. Josiane, the daughter of a smallholder farmer settled through agrarian reform and currently Coordinator of Productive Chains at the Secretariat of Supply, Cooperativism, and Food Sovereignty in the Ministry of Agricultural Development, highlighted the capillarity and organizational strength of family agriculture across Brazil’s diverse biomes. Agroecology, strongly rooted in the MST’s trajectory, is central to this process. Speaking from her personal and professional experience in agrarian reform settlements, Josiane emphasizes: “For us, agroecology is not just a production technique. It is a way of life — a social, political, and collective process rooted in the territory, in popular knowledge, and in our autonomy.” She also emphasized the importance of state support — especially through institutions like EMBRAPA — in strengthening agroecological transitions. Public research and technical assistance, combined with peasant innovation in seed saving, cooperative organization, and community exchanges, have made agroecology a viable path for food sovereignty. Josiane stressed that agroecology must not be reduced to a commodity or monoculture; rather, it flourishes through decentralized, diverse, and context-specific strategies. These practices often arise out of necessity, shaped by exclusion from formal markets and infrastructure. Ana reinforced the strategic role of local food systems in counteracting economic volatility and environmental degradation. Prioritizing biodiversity, autonomy, and decentralized production, these systems constitute grounded alternatives to the industrial model.

Crisis and Adaptation: Food, Climate, and Gender:

The climate crisis intensifies existing challenges. Ana referenced the 2024 floods in Rio Grande do Sul, which destroyed much of the rice harvest, contributing to rising prices and a food supply crisis. Despite Brazil’s global standing as a grain producer, it faced the paradox of needing to import staple foods. This situation underscored the vulnerability of concentrated production and the need for diversified, decentralized food systems. Ana and Josiane both stressed the role of women and youth as central to transforming rural territories. Reflecting on the gendered dimension of food sovereignty, Josiane highlights: “Women are the guardians of seeds, of food culture, of water and soil. Without them, there is no continuity, there is no future in the countryside.” Supporting their protagonism is essential to ensuring generational continuity and fostering innovation in rural life. She noted that young people are increasingly disinclined to remain in rural areas due to a lack of support, education, and technological tools. Addressing this requires investment in youth-oriented rural policies that promote dignity and innovation. Mechanization also emerged as a key issue. Ana noted that only 3% of farms in Brazil’s Northeast are mechanized. Many smallholders still harvest manually, limiting productivity and overburdening aging rural populations. Mechanization adapted to small-scale contexts is vital for food sovereignty and labor dignity. Both speakers emphasized that access to appropriate technology is crucial for reducing the burden of rural labor and making farming a viable life project for future generations.

Infrastructure, Market Access, and State Policy:

Ana highlighted the importance of existing public policies like the Food Acquisition Program (PAA) and the National School Feeding Program (PNAE). These initiatives connect family farmers to markets while enhancing food security. The PNAE, for instance, mandates that 30% of school meal budgets come from family farming. This provision enables farmers to plan production with guaranteed buyers and simultaneously improves children’s access to fresh, nutritious food. Discussing these public policies, Ana asserts: “The PAA and the PNAE are more than just acquisition programs — they put real food on the table and generate income in places agribusiness never reaches.” Josiane emphasized that these programs are transformative not just economically, but culturally and structurally. They integrate rural production into local economies and revalue peasant modes of life. However, both speakers acknowledged the fragility of these policies in the face of political shifts and budgetary constraints, reinforcing the need for persistent grassroots advocacy. They also pointed to other market strategies that complement institutional procurement, including open-air markets, community-supported agriculture, and direct-to-consumer models. In several regions, food exchanges rooted in cultural traditions still play a vital role in food access, particularly among Indigenous and Quilombola communities — offering valuable models that could be strengthened or scaled in broader food system planning.

Beyond Green Transitions: Territorial Justice and Development Models:

While the expansion of renewable energy infrastructure — especially solar and wind — has triggered new land disputes in Brazil, Ana and Josiane used these cases to highlight a deeper issue: the danger of reproducing colonial and extractive patterns under new guises. These so-called “green” transitions risk reinforcing territorial dispossession when implemented without democratic consultation, participatory planning, or alignment with food sovereignty. Both speakers called attention to the need for a paradigm shift — one that places the defense of territories and the autonomy of rural peoples at the center of development. Agroecological transitions, solidarity economies, and community-managed energy systems are not just technical alternatives but part of a broader political-ecological struggle for justice.

The Experience of the MST: Scaling Alternatives:

Josiane concluded with a reflection on the transformative work of the MST, which she sees as her political and personal foundation. The movement’s wide territorial presence, along with its dozens of cooperatives and agroindustries, demonstrates that grassroots alternatives are not marginal experiments but concrete, scalable solutions. From seed banks to bioinput production and territorial self-organization, the MST embodies many of the principles of environmental justice. Its cooperatives not only produce food but also mobilize for policy change and social transformation. Josiane framed these efforts not as isolated interventions but as part of a broader social movement to reclaim land, redefine development, and build autonomy from the ground up. She emphasized that her personal experience — growing up in a settlement, participating in cooperative building, and seeing her family’s food reach public schools — is evidence of the tangible, everyday impact of food sovereignty. Ana echoed that point, affirming the importance of valuing lived experience as a guide for policymaking. For both Ana and Josiane, these initiatives are living proof that environmental justice and food sovereignty must go hand in hand. Their testimonies illuminate how grassroots movements in Brazil are not only resisting systemic injustice but actively constructing the foundations of a different future.

The complete lecture can be accessed at: