This is what Manuel Bertoldi said in an interview with Real World Radio. He is member of the Secretariat of the group and visited Mexico and other Meso-American countries where there is a process of "appropriation of territories and strategic resources by imperialism".

Manuel said that “the resistance to these processes generates alternatives from the peoples, such as the case of food sovereignty” and agroecology against the business and monopolic food production model that represent transnational corporations. Another example is the self-management of industries by groups of workers once capitalists disregard them, many times with the complicity of governments.

“We highlight the fact that the Summit is a time of mobilization to show that we, at the bottom, are organized, mobilized, resisting and generating alternatives”, said Manuel.

The movements share a common agenda of mobilizations at world level, such as the World Environment Day that will be celebrated on June 5 and activities on June 20th, that coincide with the opening of the Rio+20 conference and the G20 meeting in Mexico.

The spaces of power are not limited to the state, in the framework of an economy strongly transnationalized. For this reason, said Manuel Bertoldi, the advocacy and dialogue with progressive governments at continental level must be joined by the mobilization and capacity-building of grassroots organizations.

An article published by the Social Movements’ Minga written by Bertoldi describes the current situation from the point of view of popular mobilization and the work towards the Peoples Summit in Rio+20: “In the past year, there were strong massive conflicts in our America, such as students protests in Chile and Colombia, the marches for the defense of water in Peru and Ecuador, the creation of a
Meso-American movement and protests against mega-mining; the massive mobilization on May 1st in Caracas, to celebrate a labor reform in favor or the popular classes and the thousands of landless farmers that took the streets on April 17th on the International Day of the Peasant Struggle in Brazil and other countries of the continent.

This diverse social movement, which is at different stages in the different countries, aims to articulate itself at continental level. An example of this is Social Movements towards ALBA”, said Manuel.

Photo: albatv.org