In addition to fighting a global pandemic, our people have been organizing movements to reunite families separated at the border, expand sanctuary for all refugees, fight back against racist and misogynistic violence towards the Asian community, and to demand an end to police killings of Black and Brown folks. Since the beginning of the year, there has been an average of 3 murders at the hands of police a day with Black and Latinx folks accounting for more than half of the victims. This week marks the one year anniversary of the murder of George Floyd. Alianza stands firm in our solidarity with the movement for Black liberation. We condemn acts of racist police violence against our people. An important part of Alianza's work is dedicating our organizing efforts to creating an alternative economy, one that values and respects life over monetary profits, in other words, a caring economy. We are promoting our knowledge of cultivating and caring for the land as a pathway to a new economy. Many of our elected leaders would have us believe that there is no funding to support a care centered economy, no funds for universal medicare, universal childcare, no funds to raise the federal minimum wage, or for our public schools, and no funds to offer free higher education. But we also know, and have been lucky to work with, some elected officials who share our sentiment and conviction that there is plenty of state and federal level funding to provide for these pillars of a care economy. There is funding if and when we redistribute funds from the overly inflated budget designated for police, Immigration & Customs Enforcement, and the military, and redirect some of these funds towards socially beneficial programs. 

We would also like to take this moment to recognize that May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and honor the long history of solidarity and movement building between Latinx campesinx and the Asian immigrant and Asian American farmworkers. While this month is meant to be a time of celebration for all of the contributions Asians have made to this country and to our many movements for justice and liberation, it is bittersweet in light of the spike in hate crimes targeting the Asian community in 2020 and 2021. We at Alianza were horrified to learn of the racist misogynist murders of Asian women in Atlanta in March, and the racially charged shooting in Indiana last month, targeting the Sikh community. Alianza stands firm in our solidarity with the Asian community and condemns anti-Asian violence. Asian migrant farmworkers have for decades worked side by side with Latinx, Inidigenous, and Black farmworkers and have been integral in the farmworkers rights movement in this country. 

May is also a month dedicated to raising awareness around the many missing and murdered indigenous women and relatives (MMIWR). We want to thank U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Deb Haaland, for her unwavering efforts to bring this issue to light on a national level. Countless indigenous women have gone missing or been murdered on and near indigenous reservations and much of the violence is often related to the extractive fossil fuel industry, as the jobs related to this industry bring many men to the area, who are not local. We recognize that violence against indigenous women is an issue that plagues not just this country but all of the Americas, and is often the reason many women migrate. Alianza condemns any and all forms of gender based violence. Violence against any woman is violence against all of us. At Alianza we understand that our mission to promote the leadership of campesinas in a national movement to demand their human rights and dignity, is intrinsically linked to all movements for justice and liberation. This is why we feel it is important to share with our members and supporters, our solidarity and support to our ally communities in the same struggle. 

Despite all of the challenges we have faced this year, less than half way through 2021, we have also seen some progress for our community. In March, two key pieces of legislation for campesinxs were introduced: the Citizenship for Essential Workers Act of 2021, which if approved, would create an expedited pathway to citizenship for over 5 million undocumented essential workers - among them, campesinas and other women workers throughout our farm and food systems. Alianza Nacional de Campesinas took part in drafting and revising the text language of this bill. Also, the Asunción Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act of 2021 was introduced and would protect campesinxs from working in extreme heat and provide heat safety standards for agricultural workers.

Last month, a federal court of appeals ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency must ban the use of chlorpyrifos, a long-sought victory for the campesinx community and part of our ongoing work to phase out toxic pesticides. In this newsletter you will be able to read about the various efforts of Alianza, our member organizations and the many campesinas struggling to find solutions that benefit their lives and the lives of their fellow workers and compatriots. As always, united in the struggle!

This year we organized our third member Convivencia. Due to the pandemic it was a virtual Convivencia, but we had the most participation yet with 85 members and 20+ staff of member organizations registered. The purpose of the gathering was to generate and share solutions to the difficult working and living conditions campesinas face.

“This Convivencia helped us... Especially to know that we should not be afraid that we should raise our voices and that we are the spokespeople for thousands and thousands of other campesinas like ourselves. Maybe not all of them can speak right now, due to fear or because there is no outlet for them, but we are their voices and here at the Convivencia, we made them heard." 

We are following up with the elected officials we spoke with, especially the ones who expressed an interest in supporting particular bills we are promoting, or modifying proposed bills to include our demands. In the coming months, Alianza will also be sharing a report synthesizing all of the issues and recommendations discussed during the Convivencia. The report will include our policy & advocacy platforms.

"For me the Convivencia was very important, because in this space we [campesinas] realize that we are not alone, that we have allies all over the country... that we can fight injustice together, we can move in the same direction with the same goal, together - for justice!" - Beatriz Gatica, Mujeres Divinas

In March, our Executive Director, Mily Treviño-Sauceda, participated in a discussion with members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and Dr. Anthony Fauci about the need to protect the Campesinx community in times of COVID-19. She was joined in the discussion by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, Rep.Raul Ruiz, MD (CA-36), Rep. Sylvia Garcia (TX-29), President of the United Farmworkers Teresa Romero, and the Director of the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities Dr. Eliseo Pérez-Stable. You can watch the full discussion HERE or by clicking on the image above.

In March & April this year, Alianza organized the annual awareness campaign called STATE OF THE CAMPESINA to draw attention to the realities faced by campesinas at work, home and in society. In the U.S., the president gives a speech each year reporting on the current living and working conditions in the country in the “State of the Union” address. Similarly, the daily reality of farmworker communities and their struggles for equality, security, and dignity deserves to be recognized and shared across the country. 

However, instead of starting off his presidency with a State of the Union Address in February, President Biden gave a speech on March 11th marking the one year anniversary of when the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic. During this speech he honored all of those who passed from the virus since its outbreak. He also announced the "American Rescue Plan" as a response to the pandemic. This was when we launched PART ONE of our virtual campaign "State of the Campesina.” During this first part of the virtual campaign, we shared messages specifically about the pandemic, vaccines and the American Rescue Plan, which included some positive provisions for the campesina community, but still left many of us out. Specifically this plan will exclude over 9.3 million immigrants and tax payers from accessing any sort of pandemic relief efforts from the federal government.

Once again Alianza joined the global annual campaign: One Billion Rising against gender based violence, which takes place every February 14th since its inception in 2013. This year's theme, Rising Gardens, made a connection between gender based violence and violence against Mother Earth. We have always stood in solidarity with women internationally against gender based violence, misogyny, and patriarchy, and we work tirelessly to amplify the voices of campesinas, women farm workers and migrant workers in the U.S. in this struggle. This campaign, organized annually by the organization V-Day, is the largest mass action to demand an end to violence against women in history. This year because of COVID-19 we led a virtual campaign, and in person events organized by our members were small and local. 

“1 in 3 women across the planet will be beaten or raped during her lifetime. That’s ONE BILLION WOMEN AND GIRLS. Every February, we rise – in countries across the world – to show our local communities and the world what one billion looks like and shine a light on the rampant impunity and injustice that survivors most often face. We rise through dance to express joy and community and celebrate the fact that we have not been defeated by this violence. We rise to show we are determined to create a new kind of consciousness – one where violence will be resisted until it is unthinkable.” - One Billion Rising

"Sexual harassment and assault is a very pervasive issue with campesinas. In our work, we have found that 9 out of 10 campesinas have been sexually harassed or assaulted at least once in their time working in the fields. "

In February we hosted a webinar as a part of this campaign, where we discussed the theme of this year's One Billion Rising campaign: Rising Gardens. During the webinar our members made the connections between gender based violence and violence against Mother Earth. Members also shared with one another the ways in which they maintain a healthy and reciprocal relationship with the land in their communities. Click on the image/link to the left to watch the full webinar.

ATTN: If you or someone you know is in a domestic violence situation, you can seek help by calling 1-800-799-SAFE (7233) Click HERE for more information and resources. You can also always reach out to our member organizations

Campesinas Rising is our nationwide annual campaign to raise awareness about and work towards eliminating the myriad forms of violence faced by campesina women and girls in the United States and globally. The idea of Campesinas Rising first emerged from a collaboration between Alianza Nacional de Campesinas and Eve Ensler as part of the global “One Billion Rising” Global Movement, the largest mass action to end violence against all women and girls. The campaign kicks off each year on March 25th, which is the first day of the National Farmworkers Awareness Campaign, and draws attention to the unique struggles that women farmworkers face. This year, at the start of this awareness week, our member organization Centro de los Derechos del Migrante led a binational coalition of allies in supporting two campesinas: Maritza Pérez and Adareli Ponce to file a first-ever petition against the U.S. under the USMCA in a pivotal moment for the fight to end gender discrimination against migrant worker women on temporary labor migration programs. 

The theme of this year’s Campesinas Rising campaign was a continuation of the theme of the One Billion Rising campaign which took place in February: Rising Gardens. The purpose of this theme is to draw connections between gender based violence and violence against Mother Earth. As campesinas and immigrants, we understand first hand that extraction and abuse of the land results in human physical illness, displacement, as well as climate chaos. But we also have first hand and ancestral knowledge of how to reverse the detrimental results of an unjust and imbalanced relationship with the land. During the Campesinas Rising campaign we hosted a webinar with our members where we shared this knowledge, as well as a social media campaign where we amplified the voices of campesinas demanding better working conditions as well as an end gender discrimination, harassment and sexual violence in the work place. Read our blog post for One Billion Rising where we explored these themes and connections further. 

The Morralitos Campaign started in 2009 by our member organization Líderes Campesinas to raise awareness about the use of pesticides, while campesinxs are working and living near the fields with their children.

This year, the Morralitos Campaign was organized virtually on social media platforms, and also some of our member organizations organized in person events to create and display the morralitos. One of the main messages that was highlighted in this year’s campaign was the action taken by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to weaken protections for farmworkers, their families and community members from toxic pesticides by allowing pesticide spraying to continue even if farmworkers or bystanders are within the immediate area. On December 21, 2020, Alianza joined a coalition of farmworker advocacy and community health groups in filing a series of legal actions against the EPA for weakening the Application Exclusion Zone (AEZ) under the Worker Protection Standard (WPS) that prevents farmworkers and rural residents from unnecessary exposure and injury to pesticides. Alianza and our member organizations the Florida Farmworker Association, Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste (PCUN), and the Rural Coalition, were a part of thiis coalition challenging these harmful rollbacks and demanding the agency protect the health and safety of farmworkers. 

Alianza is proud to be a recipient of the Mosaic Movement Infrastructure Grant to support our collaborative project “Campesinas Helping to Create a Safe and Healthy Mother Earth.” We are working in partnership with our member organizations: La Mujer Obrera, Líderes Campesinas, and Rural Coalition.

We hold biweekly meetings with all our member organizations to advocate for the human rights of campesinas during COVID-19. We share information about the challenges and needs of farmworker families during this pandemic. We share the efforts and actions taken by our membership to address the effects of COVID-19 in our communities, as well as to ensure our communities can access the vaccine safely.

Upcoming work later in 2021 & 2022: Alianza is planning trainings for our member organizations on gender based violence, health & safety including: heat stress, pesticides, COVID19, as well as policy and advocacy trainings on our four priority areas. For more information you can send an email to: alianzanacionalcampesinas@gmail.com

The Mission of ALIANZA NACIONAL DE CAMPESINAS (National Alliance of Farmworker Women) is to unify the struggle and promote leadership of campesinas in a national movement to create major visibility and advocate for change that ensures their human rights.