Mexico is home to tens of millions of small producers increasingly squeezed off their land by unfair trade policies and public neglect. The National Union of Autonomous Regional Peasant Organizations (UNORCA) is an autonomous, non-profit and non-partisan network of Mexican campesino and indigenous farming organizations advocating for small farmers’ livelihoods and rights. It was established in 1985.

With about 1,400 regional member organizations and about 200,000 producers in 27 Mexican states, UNORCA represents a powerful and diverse constituency of farmers and indigenous communities in Mexico.

Since 1985 UNORCA has provided technical assistance in natural resource management, marketing, and implementation of projects and programs for productive enterprises, rural development, human and indigenous rights and agrarian issues for peasant and indigenous peoples’ organizations. They provide support and financing for agricultural, livestock, forestry and fisheries projects.

In addition to its national agenda, UNORCA is part of a growing international farmers' movement, the Vía Campesina, which struggles for a sustainable and farmer and farmworker-oriented agriculture, for a dignified life in the countryside and for peoples’ food sovereignty.

Through the Presente Fund, Grassroots has supported leadership development training for UNORCA in 2006. In 2007 we are working with UNORCA on a new project focused on pro-family farmer agrarian policies, including pushing a re-negotiation of the agricultural provisions of NAFTA.