[act-ma] call to arms from ciclovida/occupy monsanto against upcoming biotech/agro business conference

[Stephanie Baird]

*PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY*


How are you? This is Ashley, with Ciclovida: Lifecycle. I just wanted to
reach out about the upcoming BIO International Convention that will be
arriving in Boston in just a couple weeks. As you may or may not know, it
is an annual gathering of some of the biggest behemoths in industrial
agriculture and the big pharma industry. The convention will be convening
from June 18-22 at the Boston Convention Center (more info at
http://convention.bio.org)

The Ciclovida team wanted to confront this gathering of corporate and
government powers by organizing and holding a counter-conference and
coordinated action for folks in grassroots movements for environmental
justice, food justice, and agricultural justice to build our power together
as they are trying to maintain a power-over. Our goals for the gathering
are:

   - Create a space to share social movement experience and resistance to
   corporate capitalism in the context of environmental justice
   - Create an alternative space for building grassroots resistance in the
   face of monstrosities of industrial agriculture and pharmaceuticals
   gathering – counter their planning with our own
   - Strengthen the Ciclovida movement in the U.S., confronting Monsanto's
   agenda to bring GMO to industrial agriculture and sharing the Ciclovida
   project from the global south that is working to counter that
   - Deepen relationships and solidarity in the broader environmental
   justice movement, while highlighting connections between global
   struggles and local struggles
   - Carry out a coordinated action against destructive Biotech conference

I just wanted to reach out to see if this convention is on your radar, if
you are planning anything personally or with an organization or movement,
and to see if you would like to get involved in organizing this gathering
beforehand or simply be part of it. Please let me know what you think about
this! The current details are:

Seeds of Resistance: An Alternative Gathering for Environmental Justice and
Movement-Building
*What:* A 2-day gathering to share, organize, learn, strategize, and build
grassroots power; including musical performances, a premier of the new
Ciclovida short film, and space for connection, conversation and
coordination for solidarity and action
*Who:* The people: activists, farmers, communities in struggle, anyone
outraged by corporate destruction of agriculture, food systems, health, and
environment
*When:* June 20, an evening gathering, and June 21, day of action
*Where:* TBD
For more info: coming soon on Facebook and Ciclovida.org<http://ciclovida.org/>

We are currently looking for: a space to hold the gathering on June 20th
from 4:30-10:30, musical acts, food donations, people who want to help out
with outreach, publicity, and mobilization, and people who want to help
with planning a strategic action for the 21st. Please let me know what you
think and if you or anyone you know would like to collaborate on pulling
this together in the next couple weeks! We are working together to pull
this together on a short time-line but are excited to mobilize people in
our networks and movements! Looking forward to hearing from you and working
with you on this!
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