Cymraeg by Yali Banton-Heath and cee-cee manrique (LWA Comms Team)
This week the LWA is launching a new campaign to ‘Re-Root Agroecology’, in service to the movement as a reminder of what it means to use the term, and why it’s crucial to understand agroecology as both a social movement and site of political struggle.
There is a general understanding that agroecology is about transforming the way we live and work with the land; adopting land management practices and farming techniques that regenerate, rather than deplete, our lands, waters and soils. While this is true, agroecology is so much more than just a set of farming techniques.
The LWA’s vision for agroecology, which is grounded in the cosmologies, practices and social movements of Indigenous people and peasant landworkers in the Majority World, is fundamentally about “sustaining human life in a way which is both socially just and ecologically balanced”. To strip this vision of its social and political context, will not only leave agroecology vulnerable to co-option, but will ultimately put those who are the most marginalised in our food systems further at risk; including Indigenous people, women, those of marginalised genders, Black and People of Colour (BPOC) and migrant workers.
We are here to re-affirm this radical vision for agroecology, to explain why we feel the current political climate calls for a re-politicisation of the term, and to share some of what the LWA is doing to keep itself rooted in a broader social movement.
Re-politisicing agroecology
Some people may ask: “Why bring politics into farming?”. Well the short answer is, farming is already political. The UK’s land ownership system is grossly unequal with more and more farmland being brought up by corporations and asset management firms; supermarkets are creaming off huge profits while farmers get next to nothing for their produce; BPOC households are disproportionately experiencing food insecurity in the UK, while ethical food has become a high-end luxury for the middle class; and those who labour in our fields, packing sheds and shop floors to put food on our table are often those struggling to feed themselves.
These inequalities prove that it’s not enough to just farm with nature, without acknowledging that not everyone is able to access land and green spaces. It’s not enough to nurture diversity in our farming systems if we’re not fighting for justice and anti-oppression in our workforce. It’s not enough to provide cheap food at affordable prices at the expense of farmer’s wages, just as it’s not enough for farmers to fetch a good price for quality produce if it’s not accessible to those at the sharp end of food poverty.
Farming is political; so our movement for agroecology must be too.
Agroecology is anti-fascist
The fact that farming is political has been brought into even sharper focus recently by the ongoing farmer protests around changes to agricultural inheritance tax. This controversy has foregrounded issues around land ownership, corporate power, generational renewal, farm income, and much much more. While the LWA stands in solidarity with the many farmers who may suffer from this blunt-instrument policy (our own members included), we firmly condemn the blatant attempts by the far-right to infiltrate the farmer’s movement and further their fascistic agenda.
Our global movement for agroecology seeks to heal not only our relationship to land and food, but also to each other. Agroecology is about ensuring everyone has access to land and food regardless of income, class, gender, ethnicity or religion, and offers a vision for an alternative food system which is diverse in its on-the-ground practices, as well as in the make-up of those who are empowered to produce food. Agroecology is therefore explicitly anti-fascist: as is the Landworkers’ Alliance. In the face of new global challenges, this vision for a agroecology is becoming even more important.
As our recent publication highlights, millions of people are expected to be displaced from their lands by extreme weather patterns, changing climates and degraded soils in the coming years, and this migration is something that our food and farming system must embrace. Migrant workers form the backbone of our global food system, and yet we know that they are subject to systemic exploitation and abhorrent working conditions wherever they bring their labour; the UK being no exception.
So it’s extremely distressing to see the global far-right and its anti-immigration sentiment become increasingly emboldened by the re-election of Trump in the US. In Europe too, there has been a chain reaction of far-right groups emerging from the peripheries to gain significant ground in national elections, and here in the UK our migrant and BPOC communities not only suffered the horrific race riots of summer 2024, but we’ve since seen a doubling-down on anti-immigration policies by the new Labour government, and we are finding more and more far right groups organising in our communities.
All of this is being compounded by divisive public figures like Jeremy Clarkson who are exploiting the concerns of Britain’s farmers, co-opting the language of ‘local food’, spreading hateful conspiracy theories about “ethnically cleanse the countryside of farmers” and playing into the anti-immigration rhetoric of Nigel Farage and Reform UK. Indeed many of our members have raised their concerns about the need to counter far-right narratives in food and farming, and a group of LWA Member Organisers have set up a ‘Far Right Out of Farming’ group specifically to address this. Last week at our 2025 AGM we hosted a session entitled ‘Far right out of farming: exploring the connections between agroecology and anti-facism’, the popularity of which was testament not only to the gravity and urgency of this work, but also to the commitment among the LWA membership to stand up to fascism.
Re-rooting Agroecology
As UK agricultural policy pivots towards environmental land management and the provision of public goods, our movement for agroecology offers a radical and hopeful alternative for the broader farming community. But a transition to agroecology must be grounded in the political struggle for equity, liberation and justice.
Too often we see agroecology used as an ‘umbrella term’ for different types of sustainable or nature-friendly farming. But this loose definition, which uproots it from its political context, is leaving it vulnerable to being co-opted and used as greenwash by big business. Time and time again we see large agricultural and food retail companies using the language of agroecology; claiming to invest in ‘regenerating nature’ and ‘protecting soil health and biodiversity’, while simultaneously handing out eye watering dividends to shareholders at the expense of workers’ rights.
Agroecology is about tackling inequality and building an economy which recognises the true value of food. It’s about paying farmers a fair price for their produce and creating dignified livelihoods for food system workers all along the supply chain. It’s about breaking down the institutional barriers and systems of discrimination which prevent people from having a relationship with the land and where their food comes from. It’s about radically transforming our food system so that it satisfies everyone’s right to food, rather than satisfying the investments of corporate shareholders. It’s about putting an end to the exploitation of land and labour, and building local food webs which provide sustenance and build solidarity in our communities.
If we want to tackle the intersecting issues that impact our food and farming system, then we must re-politicise agroecology and seek systemic change. This is why we have published a statement which outlines what the LWA means by ‘agroecology’, re-rooting it as a social movement and a site of political struggle. The statement includes a shorter definition, as well as a longer definition which delves deeper into some of the different social and political aspects of agroecology.
Our movement for agroecology is anti-racist, anti-capitalist, in support of diverse genders, and embedded in the grassroots of our communities. We cannot hold these values quietly, to do so leaves them open to doubt.
In the current political context it is crucial that as a movement we embrace the need to adapt and grow. We must constantly re-affirm and embody our values, and ensure that we don’t cede ground to right-wing ideologues and their attempts to co-opt farming and land work, infiltrate rural communities and undermine discourses around food sovereignty.
This is not easy work. We are constantly learning, self-reflecting, grappling with difficult feelings and sometimes contradictions. Our intention is not to create friction or fracture the movement, but to embed justice within it. There may be moments of tension, and difficult conversations to be had – including about ourselves as an organisation – but we know this work is vital to building a diverse and powerful international movement for agroecology.
Further reading
LWA ‘Re-Rooting Agroecology’ Statement (February 2025)
10 Years of the LWA: Where are we with our racial justice work? (LWA Blog, February 2024)
Why we need racial justice in farming (LWA Blog, September 2020)
Agroecology as a Movement, Episode 1: Introduction (February 2025)
The Landworkers’ Alliance supports trans landworkers (LWA Blog, April 2022)
Food Sovereignty is about more than just food (LWA Blog, April 2022)
Join us in London on April 26th for the ‘Food In Our Hands March’ 2025!
We are building momentum for a big march in London on April 26th 2025, which will unite our movement and show an alternative for a food system rooted in agroecological principles.
We do not have to sink into the hands of fascism and we will not platform millionaire tax-dodgers who peddle racial hatred or anti-immigrant rhetoric. We have a better story to tell, under banners of inclusivity, that represents solidarity with our fellow landworkers in Palestine, Ogoniland, the Amazon, and all over the globe; with our queer siblings; with migrant workers; with food system workers and everyone experiencing the injustices of the industrial global food system.
