This is a CTP of initiative: La Via Campesina/RMRU (Uruguay)
This CTP refers to the process of creating the RMRU as a result of a long process that began 6 or 7 years earlier. The narrative made by her referents highlights that her origins as an organization were marked by a strong component of identification among women in relation to certain themes that were of interest to all who at that time accompanied their husbands in different meetings of producers. Thus, there was a "process of recognition" between the women themselves and between women and certain themes. This intersection of views on certain issues among rural women began to emerge as a result of a process begun years ago by some women who, based around the Study Group on the Status of Women in Uruguay (GRECMU, in its spanish initials), had Initiated a way of joint reflection with the rural women of the milk area of San José.
"The Women's Group of the Rural Milk Area was there, in those laps with some other companions, the network was in fact forming and they had many workshops with women. And one day a friend told me "are we going to one of these workshops?", Well, let's go. There were different workshops that were taking people away, we had a lot of contact at the time with GRECMU people, and they were all things that overflowed us, you left the workshops saying "I want to listen more, I want to understand more", because You did not have access to another opportunity and information that in the long run was training."
The referents of the RMRU recognize the importance of these exchanges to consolidate the project of the national network:
"In the countryside, the isolation is very great, so we set out to get together once in a while. From the Development Society came a sociologist who helped to group us. Then came the Study Group on the Status of Women (Grecmu) in 1987. Work began with women to reflect on the creation of a space and the possibility of providing a necessary service in the area. Thus we formed three groups, dedicating ourselves in a first stage to services related to health. In order to generate income for the group we built a hothouse to produce and sell vegetables. And we began the test of several aromatic herbs with the support of an agronomist. The seeds were brought from the outside, and being our totally organic form of production, we became pioneers in Uruguay "
Thus, at the beginning of the 1990s, they decided to create the RMRU with the goal of working in an associated way to protect their territory and their well-being in an adjusted balance between social inclusion, market entry, respect for the environment and slow migration From young people to cities.
As mentioned in the previous section, the origins of the RMRU were associated with an ongoing process of work begun in the mid-1980s between women from academia and rural women.
Also, this process and the identification of problems such as those identified by the network in its beginnings were directly related to the recovery of democracy that Uruguay experienced since 1985. On the other hand, the activity developed by academics in the territory responded to a specific need of these sectors that saw limited work in the University intervened by the dictatorship.
"In Uruguay, during the years of dictatorship, began to form a critical mass on the status of women in Latin American countries. This critical mass was made up of women activists and academics who had to leave their universities at the university level - due to the intervention of the University by the de military government - and began to develop their activity in Centers like GRECMU. These centers obtained funds through the sending of money from abroad that came to those who were still in Uruguay so that they could develop a critical activity."
It is also possible to identify a process of co-production linked to the changes experienced in the 1980s and 1990s in the approach that was being taken to the relationship between women and development. In the decades mentioned, the concept "women", with which until that moment was worked, happened to move by admitting to the concept of "gender". This implied the conceptualization and implementation of a new approach to the relationship between women and development called "Gender in Development", which, far from presenting a homogeneous and finished vision, meant - and still implies - a constant process of generating strategies To include gender theory in development practice.
The creation of the RMRU occurred as part of the changes that were experienced in Uruguay since the mid-1980s with the recovery of democracy. The dictatorship that ruled the country since 1973 made an attempt to institutionalize the changes generated through a constitutional reform project that was plebiscited in 1980. The proposal was rejected by opening a stage of transition that ended with the return of democratic order in 1985 . In this context, there was a revival of political, trade union and student activity that favored the emergence of new forms of organization and new problems.
On the other hand, the agricultural sector in Uruguay experienced at this stage a deep crisis that was expressed in a fall of livestock and dairy production. These productive problems were aggravated by the weakness shown by the country's economy in the face of crises suffered by neighboring countries such as Brazil and Argentina. That was the case of the debt crisis experienced by both countries in 1982 and the deep crisis Argentina suffered in the late 1980s.
In relation to the specific profile of the RMRU, as a women's organization, the network emerged as a consequence of a progress in the gender approach. This approach was undoubtedly favored by advances made in the international context, including the First World Conference on Women in Development in Mexico in 1975; The declaration by the United Nations of 1975 as the International Year of Women; The formulation of the Decade for Women (1976-1985); The adoption in 1979 of the "United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women"; And the promulgation in 1985 of the Nairobi Strategies for the Advancement of Women.
The creation of the RMRU emerged as a response to the problems experienced by rural women in Uruguay in the mid-1980s. The biggest challenge they faced was to formalize a women's organization in rural areas, as it was somewhat unusual in that context. context. For this reason, the cooperative relations established with groups of academics such as GRECMU were very important.
The main dispute in these early years was to discuss and modify the traditional role of women in rural areas, convince and convince themselves that it was the organization of women themselves that could generate solutions to the problems that were suffered. Part of the resistance they had to face was lived in their own families who claimed that these new activities they did limited the time they had to devote to their duties in the care of the home and children.
However, the most profound change was the one they had to make themselves. The founders of the RMRU had to break with the prejudices that they themselves had about the role that they had to fulfill.
In this CTP it can be observed that the women who were involved in the creation of the RMRU had foreseen this event for several years and had advanced in concrete actions in that sense.
"The idea of the network emerged in 1985 when the first National Milk Fair was organized, organized by the National Cooperative of Milk Producers (CONAPROLE) and the producers of the department of San José. In that instance, women wives of producers, who in turn were close to the guild and saw that there were subjects that, without being in contact with each other, were interested in all ... health, education, their situation As women, reflection on themselves, in front of themselves, their children, their production."
However, the same referents acknowledge that the results obtained at that time were surprising. They were also aware that what they were doing was not normal in those years and had no antecedents.
"Since there was an activity that brought about 150, 200 women and came out very good things was like the first shock with the system, women who came from outside, not because of the shock itself, but because it was rare to see women That they would have organized that, and that they would have done well; It was like everything weird. From there arises the same curiosity in Canelones and Florida. These women from San José begin to accompany these two groups and almost a year, these three groups go ahead. And there they begin to work in their different areas, some groups more destined to support, what had to do with accompanying the guilds, others more focused on the health issue, as indeed occurs with the women of Florida, others Of the woman herself and of promoting other women to be grouped, as is the case with women in the Florida dairy area ... all with their own characteristics but all together."
The creation of the RMRU was the result of a profound learning process that had begun six or seven years earlier. This learning was marked by the articulation that they established with academics and that allowed to identify the emerging problems in the rural world in Uruguay from a gender perspective.
The women participating in this first stage were able to understand the problems such as the depopulation of rural areas, limited access to health, and the negative effects of the agricultural crisis on their lives and their families.
Likewise, they emphasize that the main learning generated in this first stage were related to the forms of organization and the methodologies implemented to work with the other groups of women members of the network. In this sense, they especially emphasize the incorporation of management skills and articulation with other spaces and organizations for the joint construction of alternatives for the resolution of their problems.
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