Peasants May Day Rally at Mannar , Sri Lanka

This year’s Farmers’ May Day declaration brought 30 key issues to the government’s attention. The declaration emphasized demands for a political solution to the national problem, stopping plans to seize lands from small-scale food producers including farmers, ensuring dignified living conditions and land rights for plantation workers, uniting the working and farming classes, immediately withdrawing from IMF loan programs, returning all lands seized from people in the North and East, halting the exploitation of natural resources, establishing food sovereignty as a fundamental right, and abolishing all repressive legislation.

Representatives from various community groups addressed the rally, sharing their experiences and perspectives on these critical issues.