A Leader of Brazil's Landless Worker's Movement will Speak on the West Side this Wednesday, October 20. Check out the info below (flier also attached) and forward to anyone else who might be interested.



Friends of the MST/Chicago Chapter Presents:

MST Leader, VANDERLY SCARABELI

Lessons from the Largest Social Movement in the Americas

Wednesday, October 20, 2004

6pm (sharp!)

Chicago Commons

3645 W. Chicago Avenue

Program

6:00-6:40 Stong Roots – documentary film on the Landless Worker’s Movement (MST)

6:40-7:15 Vanderly Scarabeli speaks about the history and current struggles of the movement, and the MST’s highly developed model of organizing for social changed.

7:15-8:00 Open diologue with Scarabeli and other leaders, organizers and activists from communities across Chicago and abroad

The MST (Landless Worker’s Movement) is the largest social movement in Latin America and one of the most successful grassroots movements in the world. Hundreds of thousands of landless peasants have taken onto themselves the task of carrying out long-overdue land reform in a country mired by unjust land distribution. Sixty percent of Brazil’s farmland lies idle, while twenty-five million peasants struggle to survive by working in temporary agriculture jobs. Its members have managed to secure land, thereby guaranteeing food security for their families, and have come up with an alternative socio-economic development model that puts people before profits.

Vanderly Scarabeli is a member of the MST’s National Leadership Committee from the state of Mato Grosso in Brazil’s west central region. He has been active in the MST since 1992.