This talk explores the colonial origins of modern international trade. Since the 1990s, the World Trade Organization, bilateral investment treaties, and free trade agreements have governed the international trade and investment regime based on free market ideology, but geopolitics, power relations, and corporate interests have shaped trade rules for over 500 years before they reached their current form.
Agroecology seeks to emulate nature in agro-ecosystems. It works in concert with natural flows and cycles and embraces diversity. It has been shown to enhance food production in small scale farming systems with low inputs and in the midst of climatic variability. But what does agroecology look like when scaled up to encompass diversified large crop fields and pastures? What does it look like when practiced in drier places? Does it imply or require larger social and economic shifts? Join us as we delve into how to think of agroecology on a larger scale.
The NFU is a partner organization to the Leveraging Ecosystems to transform Agriculture on the Prairies (LEAP) Project at the University of Manitoba. The LEAP Project seeks to explore agricultural intensification strategies and design farming systems that use technology and nature-based tools to reduce GHG emissions, capture carbon, support biodiversity, and help agriculture mitigate and adapt to negative effects of climate change.
Join Dr. Anushay Malik in this NFUniversity session as she chronicles the rise and fall of the Canadian Farmworkers Union (CFU) and examines its lasting impact. Through this exploration, uncover key insights into labor organizing, the role of migrant women, and the ongoing struggles faced by South Asian farmworkers in rural BC today.
Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAFs) are lower-emission, non-fossil-fuel energy sources for the world’s aircraft fleet—“drop-in” fuels that require no modifications to aircraft or engines. The proposal is to make SAFs largely from biological sources: corn, soybeans, and canola now and over the next decade or so, and then increasingly from straw and other “agricultural residues” and
How do rising farm debts, land commodification, and market dependence create insecurity and undermine rural communities? Learn from Astra Taylor, writer, filmmaker and activist about how solidarity serves as both a principle and practice to achieve security and justice through collective action and interdependence.
Explore how “green” initiatives like carbon offsets, biofuel crops, and tree plantations are driving land inequality and food insecurity. With insights from the IPES-Food Land Squeeze Report and expert Sofía Monsalve Suárez, you'll uncover the realities of land grabbing, its impacts on smallholder farmers, and innovative solutions being pursued globally, including in Colombia. Join us to dive into the urgent fight for land justice and sustainable agriculture.
The right to repair goes beyond the ability for consumers to repair electronics, appliances, and machinery. The right to repair is about independence and freedom from major manufacturers in order to have access to timely and inexpensive repairs, as well as operability between products that suit the needs of consumers and farm businesses.
Join Bill Rees and Rick Munroe as they unpack the root cause of our environmental crises—ecological overshoot—and explore how communities can prepare for a sustainable future amidst the challenges of unchecked growth and resource depletion.
Utopia is not an ideal created by philosophers– it is the real struggle in our everyday lives to organize the spaces of our lives around freedom, flourishing, and solidarity instead of accumulation, alienation, and domination. Join in on imagining a better world for farmers, farming and agriculture is an essential tool for change.
The National Farmers Union / L’Union Nationale des Fermiers is unique among farm organizations: we advocate for people’s interests against corporate control of our food system.
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