The Asian People’s Exchange for Food Sovereignty and Agroecology or the APEX Platform held its first regional conference on October 4 – 8, 2021 with the theme “Climate, Seeds and Biodiversity: Towards Just and Sustainable Food Systems”.

Initially planned for a face-to-face gathering, the conference was held via Zoom. Despite the limitations brought by the COVID-19 pandemic, at least 90 APEX partners and friends from 13 countries and over 20 organizations joined the week-long online activity.

The conference focused on climate, seeds and biodiversity, and food systems, with some partners sharing their experiences on these urgent issues affecting food and agriculture. BARCIK shared their seeds conservation program to contribute to seeds and biodiversity discussions, while MASIPAG shared their initiatives on farmer-led breeding. Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas/Peasant Movement of the Philippines (KMP), Seruni and Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT) shared their lessons, results, and impacts campaigns on food systems.

The conference held a workshop on the fourth day with the participants divided into eight groups and grouped by country. Each workshop group discussed the focus issues in their countries that could be the starting point for advocacy and education. They also came up with topics or activities in agroecology and PLD that they want APEX to take on in the future.

“I am very much impressed by how well the collaboration is organized within APEX and in your respective national context. From my own experience, it’s not really common for civil society organizations to cooperate in such a trustful and respectful atmosphere of partnership. And even more remarkable to me is that through APEX, you show a lot of trust in Misereor too. It’s really an honor that you accept us as allies in a shared struggle.” said Dr Bernd Borhnorst, MISEREOR’s Managing Director for International Cooperation, at the opening of the conference.

In 2021, APEX organized at least 14 online sessions (including the regional conference) that focused on topics and issues important to partners and their communities. The platform invited experts on pesticides (PANAP Pesticides Team); farmers’ rights, legislations concerning farmers’ interests (Shalini Butani, policy researcher; Narasimha Reddy Donthi, agricultural policy scholar ); and climate issues that affect agriculture (Harjeet Singh, Satat Sampada; Dr Joachim Milz, Ecotop) to share their experience and knowledge.

“We have all embarked on this journey for almost a year now. Towards people-led agroecology implementation and to be able to attain food security for the communities, we are working as co-equal partners for rural development. And at the same time engage our respective governments to pursue agricultural policy that recognizes the vital role of small farmer workers, rural women, pastoralists and indigenous people in achieving food sovereignty.” Cristino Paneiro, national coordinator of MASIPAG said.

Moreover, Sarojeni Rengam, executive director of PANAP, recognized the importance of learning and sharing experiences that contribute to peoples’ movements. “It has been amazing that this collaboration that we have through a process of consultations, workshops and series of discussions that we are able to develop a strong platform where we learn together from experts and each other,” she said.
“What we are also seeing in this platform is sharing of food producers, farmers and indigenous peoples’ wisdom in terms of solutions and innovations. I am looking forward to more discussions on how we could work together to enrich our knowledge and wisdom, and also to collaborate, for the future of our children.” Rengam added.

Moving forward, partners committed that they will continue with the APEX process while at the same time assisting rural communities in pursuing agroecological farming and attaining food sovereignty to achieve a people-led food systems change.

PAN Asia Pacific (PANAP) and Magsasaka at Siyentipiko Para sa Pag-Unlad ng Agrikultura (MASIPAG), with support from MISEREOR, are coordinating the APEX Platform. APEX aims to strengthen the capacities of the peoples’ movement in Asia to achieve food sovereignty through agroecology, advance people-led development strategies and approaches, engage in advocacy for policy reforms and help build peoples’ movements.