Background and Context

The world's natural ecosystem is under stress and its vast resources increasingly being depleted and degraded. Polluted waters, eroded soils, and deforested mountains are evident across the globe. Human activities and consumption have put the environment in peril.

Farming methods have degraded soils, dried up aquifers, polluted waters, and caused the extinction of animal and plant species. Soil degradation, including nutrient depletion and salinization, is widespread, while water sources are being polluted by excessive fertilizer and pesticide use. The use of high yielding varieties of crops, which require extensive irrigation, is draining more water than is being replenished by rainfall. About 70% of freshwater used by humans every year goes to agriculture.

Only some 20% of the earth's original forest remains undisturbed. Forests are the habitat of 50 to 90% of the world's plants and animals on land, which have mainly provided the food and other basics that humans need to survive. Unfortunately, 76 countries have already lost all of their frontier forest. Another 11 nations are about to lose their last remaining frontier forests, having fewer than 5% of these forests left, all of which are in danger.

Overall, 39% of the world's remaining frontier forests are endangered, with logging posing the greatest menace. Global wood consumption has increased 64% since the early 1960s. Old growth and secondary growth forests provide 78% of all lumber, pulp, and other industrial wood. Mining activities, which entail large-scale cutting of trees in mineral-rich upland areas, also contribute to deforestation.

Meanwhile, coral reefs around the world have been damaged directly through harmful practices such as coral mining, trawling, and indiscriminate coastal development. There are also various indirect sources of devastation, such as sediment from inland deforestation, mine tailings washing out to sea, destruction of mangroves, industrial pollution and nutrient pollution contributed by sewage, fertilizers, and urban runoff.

At a global scale, some 58% of the world's coral reefs are endangered, with about 27% of reefs at high risk. Southeast Asia's coral reefs, which are the most species-diverse in the world, are also the most threatened, with more than 80% at risk. Overexploitation of reef resources greatly affects marine biodiversity as well as fish harvest potentials.

Freshwater systems occupy only 0.8% of the earth's surface. Humans and many animal species depend on freshwater for survival. Freshwater systems are also vital as habitat for a wealth of species. But threats to freshwater resources, such as physical alteration from dams and canals, pollution, overharvesting of fish and shellfish, etc., have increased in scope and impact in the last century.

In the last two decades, corporate-led globalization has accelerated this reckless consumption of resources that is threatening the earth and its people. Though it is true that consumption has increased worldwide, there is a huge gap in consumption levels between developed and underdeveloped countries. Rich countries accounted for 80% of total private consumption of goods and services, while poor nations accounted for less than two percent.

Rationale

Much of the world's remaining resources can be found in Asia, Africa and Latin America, where, ironically, majority of the world's poor live. These regions are thus the targets of corporations for natural resources extraction to keep industries going.

The impact of overexploitation of the earth's natural resources is greatest on the poor and marginalized peasants, workers, fisherfolk, and indigenous communities suffer the most from resource depletion and environmental degradation.

Peasants face a host of problems due to corporate-controlled agricultural systems that put in place unsustainable farming methods dependent on environmentally harmful chemicals. Workers in extractive industries such as mining are the first to endure pollutive methods that pose health and ecological hazards. Fishing communities contend with dwindling catch due to destruction of coral reefs and overfishing by big commercial fishers. Deforestation caused by logging and operations of mining corporations are destroying ancestral domains of indigenous peoples.

But these sectors that are affected by overexploitation of natural resources and environmental damage and advocates of environmental preservation still have to strengthen coordination among them and consolidate efforts in addressing these issues. As stakeholders in the earth's future, the people, especially the sectors mentioned, should proactively move to stop unbridled resource extraction and environmentally harmful practices promoted by globalization.

Besides the need to consolidate the efforts of various sectors and interest groups among the people into a synergy of people's power, gaining greater legitimacy by a broader democratic representation that includes sectors seen to be benefiting exploitation of natural resources such as certain labor sectors and small enterprises, there is also a need to further develop the handling of issues to address the question of overall people's economic rights and interests and benefit. In the context of globalization, the more aggressive opening of natural resources for corporate exploitation takes this issue into a collision course between the peoples democratic interests and welfare and corporate interests supported by government and multilateral institutions.

The developments in Bolivia in relation to water and to the country's oil and gas resources and the struggle of the indigenous people who comprise the majority of the population leading to the collapse of globalist governments and the emergence of a progressive Bolivarian regime of Evo Morales puts focus into this issue of great interest for many social and environmentalist movements around the world. The lessons and implications of this victory serves as an important point of discussion for a gathering of various movements around Asia and the rest of the world.

Conference objectives and content

The People's Convention on Natural Resources aims to bring together those sectors most affected by natural resource degradation, develop a common platform promoting the primacy of people and planet over profit and develop the strategy of people's sovereignty in the framework of stewardship over natural resources.

Specifically, its objectives shall be to:

1. Achieve a common understanding of the issue of natural resources overexploitation in the context of corporate globalization in its different areas, contexts and forms;

1. Develop researches into various aspects of the issue of natural resources and promote coordination on research and information sharing in these aspects;

1. Bring different stakeholders on the issue of natural resources into a common discussion to build a policy advocacy platform based on the principle of people and planet over profit to stop overexploitation by corporations promoted by policies of corporate globalization; and

1. Explore possible international alternative people-powered mechanisms for protecting the environment in the framework of sustainable utilization of natural resources for the benefit of the community.

Proposed Program

Day 1 Theme: Opening and General Issue Discussions

Day 2 Theme: Minerals and Forestry

Day 3 Theme: Freshwater and Marine Resources

Day 4 Theme: Planning, Synthesis and Closing Activities

Proposed Workshop Axes (running themes):

• FTA- Bits- Regionals & c/o ARENA, (Thai NGO COD/FTA Watch)
• Women & c/o APWLD-WEN Task Force, (Thai Women Action Network)
• Indigenous Peoples & c/o SDF (AIPP-IMPECT-CPA)
• Financing - Export Credit, IFI, Commercial Banks - AidWatch
• Neo-liberal policies promoted through & WB-IMF, WTO, UN, Regionals (APEC), ADB, National Governments &c/o IBON, (AFTINET, IGJ)
• Workers & AMRC-EILER
• MEAs - FOEI
• People's alternatives, opportunities for international advocacy and mechanisms for struggle & ROOTS, PARC, Thai Women Action Network

• Lead groups responsible for workshop axes are to design their overall program. They are expected to develop more specific titles/topics, look into research aspects, develop papers, and select speakers. During the workshop proper, the lead organizations will also develop the proposals and submit the report.

Proposed Key Individual Workshops

1. Land &PAN AP
   1. Land Reform and Land rights
   2. Poisoning Agricultural Land
   3. Reduction of Agricultural Land through Conversion & tourism, industry
   4. Agribusiness and corporatization/landgrabbing

1. Genetic Resources
   1. Biopiracy
   2. Biopatenting and GMOs
   3. Corporate Strategy for Destroying Genetic Resources

1. Forestry
   1. Climate change & deforestation, Kyoto, carbon credits
   2. Integrated industry-monoculture-paper
   3. Illegal Logging and Corruption

1. Mining
   1. Militarization
   2. Oil and Gas
   3. Poisoning/Displacement
   4. Role of Finance and Trade in ores

1. Freshwater
   1. Water Utilities, Services
   2. Infrastructure & dams, river control, lakes, canals
   3. Allocation of Water Resources
   4. Commodification
   5. Water scarcity

1. Marine/Coastal
   1. Privatization of the sea
   2. Development Priorities of Coastal Resources
   3. Seabed Management and exploitation
   4. Post tsunami issues
   5. Privatization of Water Transport Infrastructure and Waterways

What are its main components?

The conference will be organized as a people's convention similar to the highly successful Dhaka People's Convention on Food Sovereignty where more than 500 participants coming mainly from peasant and other rural social movements attended.

As a people's convention, it is designed to have more decentralized activities like workshops, speak-outs and performances, seminars and the like, while maintaining centralized plenary sessions in the mornings on various themes. The plenary sessions are not organized as formal conference plenary sessions but combine speak outs, performances and panels of inputs with short speeches.

The program is designed as to cover three main themes: land and genetic resources, freshwater and marine resources, forests and mineral resources. At the minimum, the Convention seeks to come up with a People's Manifesto or Agenda as the expression of a unified platform encompassing concerns and aspirations of various sectors on the natural resources and environment issue across the global regions. The Convention will also come out with a statement that addresses immediate concerns and issues. The maximum goal is to realize the formation of a framework for working together and/or start the formation of a broad alliance or organizational platform to cover the different sectors around the regions.

The Convention shall run for 3 ½ days. Two days before the Convention, an optional exposure tour is organized for foreign participants to meet with local organizations. On the second day of the Convention proper, a public event is scheduled where the participants can interact with the local population on urgent issues on natural resources in the province. And then on the fifth day, after the convention, there is a plan to organize the first Assembly of Asian water advocates organized by the Water for the People Network-Asia.

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