Fertile
Fundraiser for a public art project with women farmers in Punjab
Thousands of women farmers are protesting at the Delhi borders. The new farm laws introduced by the Indian government are set to worsen already existing inequalities and challenges they face. At all levels of the mobilization women have been at the forefront- from planning, to preparing food, to placing their bodies at the barricades on the frontlines.
Women farmers stand at the intersection of a dual struggle – against the state government’s neoliberal policies on the one hand and patriarchy on the other. As the protests unfold, women have taken up the role of leaders and agents of (much needed, deep seeded) revolutionary change.
More than half of India’s population work in the agricultural sector and Punjab is the largest producer of essential staple grains in the country. The new farm laws will destabilize that grain economy, making the country’s food supply, those who sustain it, and those who depend on it vulnerable to (unequal) global market forces, risking widespread food insecurity for all.
In response, farmers unions from Punjab and Haryana have led hundreds of thousands of farmers from across North India in protest demanding that the new farm laws be revoked.