Reclaim the Fields International Gathering 2015

About the camp

Reclaim the Fields (or RTF) UK was born in 2011, as a star in a wider con­stel­la­tion of food and land strug­gles that reach­es around the globe. Since 2011, camps and oth­er RTF gath­er­ings have helped sup­port local com­mu­ni­ties in strug­gle, share skills, devel­oped net­works, and strength­ened the resis­tance to exploita­tion, in Bris­tol, west Lon­don, Glouces­ter­shire, Not­ting­ham and Fife among oth­er loca­tions.

Every two years there is also an inter­na­tion­al camp, where peo­ple from around Europe and beyond meet togeth­er to sup­port a local strug­gle (from gold min­ing in Roma­nia to open cast coal min­ing in Ger­many, for exam­ple). Peo­ple share share sto­ries and ideas about resis­tance and reclaim­ing our food sys­tem beyond nation­al bor­ders. This year, an inter­na­tion­al gath­er­ing will be held in the UK, in Dudle­ston, Shrop­shire, on the Welsh/English bor­der.

The aims of the camp are:

• To sup­port local com­mu­ni­ties in the west and north west of Eng­land, and the north of Wales with their strug­gles against frack­ing
• To increase par­tic­i­pa­tion in Reclaim the Fields
• To demon­strate vis­i­ble, active oppo­si­tion to prison con­struc­tion
• To sup­port Dudle­ston Com­mu­ni­ty Pro­tec­tion Camp build a gar­den and infra­struc­ture to become more self-reliant
• To demon­strate the inter­con­nec­tion between these strug­gles
• To inspire and rad­i­calise every­one involved

What’s taking place?

• Two days of Action – Tues­day 1st & Wednes­day 2nd Sep­tem­ber – demon­stra­tions & actions against com­pa­nies involved in the con­struc­tion of the North Wales prison, as well as local frack­ing-relat­ed tar­gets.

• Work­shops & Skill­shares – Over the bank hol­i­day week­end there will be abun­dant oppor­tu­ni­ties to learn, share, dis­cuss and con­nect with oth­er peo­ple.

• Build­ing & Grow­ing on the site – Be part of installing gar­dens & low impact infra­struc­ture at the com­mu­ni­ty pro­tec­tion camp. Learn about per­ma­cul­ture, agroe­col­o­gy, for­est gar­den­ing, mush­room grow­ing, pal­let con­struc­tion, com­post toi­let mak­ing, off-grid electrics and more.

Why this camp? Why now?

• This camp has been organ­ised to sup­port the local com­mu­ni­ty in Dudle­ston to resist frack­ing in their area (as well as work­ing with oth­er local anti-frack­ing groups & pro­tec­tion camps in the North West who have been resist­ing extreme ener­gy devel­op­ments for a num­ber of years). To find out more about their strug­gle vis­it: http://frack-off.org.uk/blockade/dudleston-community-protection-camp/

• It has also been organ­ised to give atten­tion to the North Wales Prison Project that is being con­struct­ed. This will be Europe’s sec­ond largest prison hold­ing 2100 pris­on­ers and the first of a num­ber of ‘mega pris­ons’ that the UK Gov­ern­ment wish to build. Click here for more infor­ma­tion about the prison, why we are against it & links to arti­cles about the prison indus­tri­al com­plex in the UK

Practical Information about the Camp

Click on the links below to find more prac­ti­cal infor­ma­tion about the camp and how to get involved:

• Work­shops & pro­gramme – what’s hap­pen­ing & how to con­tribute
• Plan­ning Actions
• Direc­tions & pub­lic trans­port infor­ma­tion
• What to bring
• Safer Spaces Agree­ment
• Acces­si­bil­i­ty of the site
• Food & dona­tions

Getting involved

This is a DIY camp and every­one is need­ed to get stuck in to make it hap­pen. Peo­ple are need­ed to:

• Sup­port with pub­lic­i­ty before the event – shar­ing the gath­er­ing online, putting posters up, encour­ag­ing your local group to get involved. Peo­ple are also need­ed to help design the pro­gramme, respond to emails & plan facil­i­ta­tion.

• Help­ing with site set up & build­ing infra­struc­ture (plan­ning this in advance & being on site a few days before the gath­er­ing)

• Sign­ing up to a shift over the week­end to help with cook­ing, site set up & safe­ty, being on the wel­come tent & so forth

• Sup­port­ing local groups to organ­ise actions

If you can help with any of these tasks please email info@reclaimthefields.noflag.org.uk

Who are Reclaim the Fields?

• Click here to read a his­to­ry of Reclaim the Fields in Europe
• Click here to read a his­to­ry of Reclaim the Fields in the UK

We are a group of peas­ants, land­less and prospec­tive peas­ants, as well as peo­ple who are tak­ing back con­trol over food pro­duc­tion.

We under­stand “peas­ants” as peo­ple who pro­duce food on a small scale, for them­selves or for the com­mu­ni­ty, pos­si­bly sell­ing a part of it. This also includes agri­cul­tur­al work­ers.

We sup­port and encour­age peo­ple to stay on the land and go back to the coun­try­side. We pro­mote food sov­er­eign­ty (as defined in the Nyéléni dec­la­ra­tion) and peas­ant agri­cul­ture, par­tic­u­lar­ly among young peo­ple and urban dwellers, as well as alter­na­tive ways of life. In Europe, the con­cept ‘food sov­er­eign­ty’ is not very com­mon and could be clar­i­fied with ideas such as ‘food auton­o­my’ and con­trol over food sys­tems by inclu­sive com­mu­ni­ties, not only nations or states. We are deter­mined to cre­ate alter­na­tives to cap­i­tal­ism through coop­er­a­tive, col­lec­tive, autonomous, real-needs-ori­ent­ed, small-scale pro­duc­tion and ini­tia­tives. We are putting the­o­ry into prac­tice and link­ing local prac­ti­cal action with glob­al polit­i­cal strug­gles.

In order to achieve this, we par­tic­i­pate in local actions through activist groups and coop­er­ate with exist­ing ini­tia­tives. This is why we choose not to be a homo­ge­neous group, but to open up to the diver­si­ty of actors fight­ing the cap­i­tal­ist food pro­duc­tion mod­el. We address the issues of access to land, col­lec­tive farm­ing, seed rights and seed exchange. We strength­en the impact of our work through coop­er­a­tion with activists who focus on dif­fer­ent tasks but who share the same vision.

Nev­er­the­less, our open­ness has some lim­its. We are deter­mined to take back con­trol over our lives and refuse any form of author­i­tar­i­an­ism and hier­ar­chy. We respect nature and liv­ing beings, but will nei­ther accept nor tol­er­ate any form of dis­crim­i­na­tion, be it based on race, reli­gion, gen­der, nation­al­i­ty, sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tion or social sta­tus. We refuse and will active­ly oppose every form of exploita­tion of oth­er peo­ple. With the same force and ener­gy, we act with kind­ness and con­vivi­al­i­ty, mak­ing sol­i­dar­i­ty a con­crete prac­tice of our dai­ly life.

We sup­port the strug­gles and visions of la Via Campesina, and work to strength­en them. We wish to share the knowl­edge and the expe­ri­ence from years of strug­gle and peas­ant life and enrich it with the per­spec­tives and strength of those of us who are not peas­ants, or not yet peas­ants. We all suf­fer the con­se­quences of the same poli­cies, and are all part of the same fight.

Read this in: French, Ger­man, Span­ish