Action Alert January 8th 2005

In this Action Alert:
--Who's on the Ag Committees?
--Update on the Time Out on GMOs campaign and ACTION YOU CAN TAKE!
--SAVE THE DATE - 2-15-05 Citizen Action Day
--Update on the Agricultural Water Quality/Medium Farm Rules issue
--Want to help peasant farmers and fisher folk? Donate to Via Campesina for Tsunami Relief

Who's on the Agriculture Committees?
We've all been waiting with our breath held to find out who would replace Ruth Towne as House Agricultural Committee Chair. The announcement was made today for both the House and Senate Committees. Here is the list:

House Agriculture Committee:
Chair: David Zuckerman of Burlington
Vice-Chair: Bill Johnson of Canaan
Ranking Member: Mitzi Johnson of South Hero
Other members:
Phillip Bartlett of Dover
Bill Botzow of Pownal
Sarah Copeland-Hanzas of Bradford
Brian Dunsmore of Georgia
Richard Lawrence of Lyndon
John Malcolm of Pawlet
Scott Orr of Charlotte
Harvey Smith of New Haven

Senate Agriculture Committee:
Chair: Sara Kittell of Franklin County
Vice-Chair: Bobby Starr of Essex-Orleans
Other Members:
Harold Giard of Addison County
Jeanette White of Windham County
Wendy Wilton from Rutland County

If you would like to see all of the committees of the House, visit:
http://www.leg.state.vt.us/legdir/comms.cfm?Body=H
And for the committees of the Senate:
http://www.leg.state.vt.us/legdir/comms.cfm?Body=S

TIME OUT ON GMOs Update and ACTION ALERT!
Yesterday was the second day of the legislative session, and the day of the "state of the state" address, which is delivered by the Governor after he is sworn into office. On hand for the ceremonies were 30 Vermonters, dressed in red, letting the governor and all of the legislators know that we are back, and we want a Time Out on GMOs. The governor definitely noticed the crowd, and after the ceremony, the Lt. Governor, Brian Dubie, came up to the group in the hallway and recognized our "enthusiasm" for the issue. After the Governor's speech, the Speaker of the House recognized the group officially, and all of the House Members took a moment to notice the group. THANK YOU TO EVERYONE who came out for this action, and to those who helped to organize it. We did not send out an email alert about this action because the effectiveness of it depended on it being a surprise. But never fear, for those of you who didn't know about it...there is plenty to do!

ACTION #1: Call your representatives and senators and ask them to SIGN ONTO THE FARMER PROTECTION ACT! Right now, we have legislation drafted that will put strict liability on the corporations that manufacture GE seed, protect farmers from lawsuits if they unintentionally have GE traits on their land, and establish rules about seed contracts that protect all Vermont farmers. Our lead sponsors are David Zuckerman in the House and Vince Illuzi and John Campbell in the Senate. Please contact YOUR representatives and senators and ask them to sign on to the Farmer Protection Act by talking to these three legislators next week. You can find out who your reps and senators are and get their telephone numbers or email addresses by visiting these websites:
House Representatives: http://www.leg.state.vt.us/legdir/districts.cfm?Body=H
Senators:
http://www.leg.state.vt.us/legdir/districts.cfm?Body=S
You can also call the Statehouse Tuesday through Friday and leave a message for your representatives at 802-828-2228. If you need help, please feel free to call the Rural Vermont office at 223-7222 or email amy@ruralvermont.org The more legislators that sign onto this bill, the easier it will be to get it passed! If a legislator asks you for the bill number, tell them a number has not been assigned yet, as the sponsors want to give as many people as possible a chance to sign on before it's officially introduced.

ACTION #2: SAVE THE DATE - CITIZEN ACTION DAY 2005
Many of you might remember that last year's Citizen Action Day was the day that the folks working for a Time Out on GMOs first wore red to signify their support for the moratorium. It was a powerful day for us, and we are going to do it again. Mark your calendar for February 15, 2005. More details will follow, but plan to spend most of the day in Montpelier. Vans will be coming from Middlebury, St. Johnsbury, Brattleboro, and St. Albans, so you don't even need to drive all the way. Please wear red for a Time Out on GMOs!

Citizen Action Day is an opportunity for you to observe Vermont's political process up-close and personal, to stand up for the environmental values you care about, and to make a difference in your state and community. Let your voice be heard while encouraging your hardworking Legislators to support the 2005 Conservation and Environmental Legislative Platform put forth by Vermont's environmental community. The Platform outlines the most important environmental priorities for the 2005 legislature, including protecting Vermont's traditional character, maintaining a healthy environment, and building a responsible energy future. It includes a Time Out on GMOs and the Farmer Protection Act! Citizen Action Day will kick off at 11 am at Christ Church (64 State Street), followed by a march to the State House at noon. More information and a complete schedule of events will follow shortly.

ACTION #3: COMMENT ON THE INTRODUCTION OF GE ALFALFA TODAY!
Go to http://www.aphis.usda.gov/ppd/rad/contact_form.html
Submit comments to the FDA telling them not to approve “Roundup Ready” alfalfa.

MAKE SURE TO INCLUDE THIS INFO: Docket # 04-085-1
Cut and paste these comments to the online form or write your own:

To Whom It May Concern:
I am writing to demand the FDA NOT approve “Roundup Ready” Alfalfa for commercial introduction in the U.S. or anywhere! The FDA has time and again released biotech crops onto an unassuming marketplace of farmers and consumers that have fell far short of there prescribed benefits and in most cases will have left us with a legacy of genetic pollution generations will be left pondering how to deal with, while the multinational corporate patent holders are counting there profits thanks to you.
By the FDA’s callous disregard for public input on their policy decisions, North America’s corn, soy, and canola crops are virtually completely contaminated with patented foreign genetic material engineered into plants they would have never found there way into by the natural processes that have gifted us with these plants in the first place. These genes are spreading to wild relatives, being doused with increasing amounts of toxic pesticides and herbicides, creating potential “super-weeds,” and countless other untold catastrophic effects on the molecular level of our very life support system. This must stop!
Do not approve “Roundup Ready” Alfalfa! Do not allow further contamination of our farms and food with unsafe, untested, and unwanted genetically engineered material.

AGRICULTURAL WATER QUALITY/MEDIUM FARM RULES UPDATE
The Agency of Agriculture has prepared a pre-draft of the Medium Farm
Operation General Permit rules. You can see this pre-draft at
http://www.vermontagriculture.com/NMPCS.htm. Right now, there is not an official comment period on the pre-draft, so we are holding off from asking people to send in comments. We'll keep you posted on the timeline for that. The next step is that the Secretary of Agriculture will present the pre-draft to both Agriculture Committees (house and senate) in the next week or so, for their approval. Then, if they approve, it will get published as a draft rule, and the official comment period will kick in. Meanwhile, advocacy groups, including Rural Vermont, Conservation Law Foundation, Vermont Natural Resources Council, and Vermont Public Interest Research Group, have requested a facilitated process to examine the technical and legal issues associated with the federal Clean Water Act, which is the driving force behind this rule. The first meeting in this process will focus on the AAPs, or Accepted Agricultural Practices, which all farms must follow. The Agency has also published a draft of a revision to the AAPs, which you can see at: http://www.vermontagriculture.com/AAP5.pdf. The meeting will be at the Agency of Agriculture on Tuesday, January 11th at 8:30 am to discuss this draft and the AAPs in general. Rural Vermont will be at this meeting, and we will keep you posted on what is happening around this issue.

HELP WITH DISASTER RELIEF EFFORTS - CALL FROM VIA CAMPESINA
If you are looking for the place to donate to help victims of the Tsunami in Asia, please consider donating to Via Campesina. Here is their call for help:
Via Campesina http://www.viacampesina.org - the global alliance of peasant, family farmer, farm worker, indigenous and landless peoples organizations, and other rural movements - calls for solidarity with the millions of people affected by the tsunami disaster and is launching a global fundraising campaign to channel assistance to affected communities of fisher folk and peasants, for their own relief and reconstruction efforts, through grassroots organizations. We ask for your donation for direct emergency support to provide basic needs of food, clean drinking water, shelter and health care to affected fisher folk and peasant families, as well as to help us initiate the long term work of reconstructing our own communities and rebuilding our livelihoods.

Make a secure on-line credit card donation now by clicking on:
https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/index.php?aid=4589
The relief philosophy of Via Campesina is that our communities should participate actively and be the key actors in the re-construction process, and that our fisher folk and peasant organizations should play a key mobilizing and supporting role. Via Campesina wants to give our communities and organizations the political support they need in this process, and to help get the funds we need for reconstruction. The funds raised in this campaign will be used to strengthen local communities as the key actors in this process.

The success of local, self-organized, civil society disaster relief efforts in previous disasters in Latin America, Asia, and Africa, contrasted with government inefficiency and top-down, demobilizing programs, has often marked a key stage in the empowerment and growth of large, popular, grassroots, civil society social movements by which previously marginalized people take control of their own lives. Let us work together at this time, and let us do so in ways that help build self-sufficiency, grassroots organization, and peoples power for the future.

In addition to the millions who have been displaced or affected, many tens of thousands have lost their homes and fishing equipment or farming tools. Fisher folk have lost their boats, and the land of peasant families has been contaminated, their crops destroyed and their farm animals lost. Your donation will help us get back on our feet.

Examples of actions already underway:
In Indonesia, the National Federation of Indonesian Peasant Organizations (FSPI), a member of Via Campesina, together with a number of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), has created a civil society relief team that is now working in Aceh (with an estimated 25,000 dead and many times more missing and/or homeless) and in North Sumatra (5,000 dead) provinces to distribute supplies, and to carry out search and rescue missions for missing people. The situation in dramatic, and at the moment (30 Dec) there is no direct communication with many areas. In Sri Lanka, perhaps the country worst hit by the tsunamis, the National Organization of Fisher folk (NAFSO) has sent 5 teams to affected areas for relief work and help communities start the task of reconstruction. They have organized fact finding missions and are now defining how to cope with the urgent relief needs while communities plan and begin to carry the medium term work of rehabilitation.

Make a secure on-line credit card donation now by clicking on:
https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/index.php?aid=4589
OR
Please make your check out to "Via Campesina/CENSA” and mail it to
CENSA/Via Campesina
2288 Fulton Street, suite 103
Berkeley, CA 94704 USA