A peasant farmers' union in North Kivu, defending the interests of smallholders and building the agroecology, cooperatives and value chains that let farming families thrive in one of the DRC's hardest regions.
The Syndicat de Défense des Intérêts Paysans (SYDIP) has organised the farmers of North Kivu since 1993. Born of the conviction that peasants have rights worth defending, it unites smallholders across Butembo, Beni and Lubero into a force that can negotiate, organise and withstand.
Through three decades of conflict and upheaval in the east, SYDIP has kept farming alive and farmers organised: improving practices, building cooperatives and value chains, and defending the people who work the land against everything that would push them off it.
SYDIP was founded in 1993 in Butembo as a union of peasant farmers, an organisation by and for smallholders, built to defend their interests at a time when few others would. It has been led ever since by its members through an elected leadership, and renews its mandate at a congress that has met faithfully for more than thirty years.
Its work is practical and patient. SYDIP trains farmers in agroecology, helps them organise into cooperatives, and builds the value chains, potato, rice, coffee and more, that turn a harvest into an income. It runs warehouses, supports access to inputs, and brings the weight of an organised membership to bear on prices and policy.
All of this in a province scarred by displacement and insecurity. That SYDIP has kept farmers farming and organised through it is, in itself, one of its quiet achievements.
SYDIP works the whole of a farming life, defending peasants' interests while building the practices, cooperatives and value chains that raise their incomes.
At its core SYDIP is a union: it organises smallholders to defend their rights, their land and their place in the rural economy, and to negotiate from collective strength.
An elected farmer leadership renewed at a congress meeting for over three decades
A standing voice for smallholders across North Kivu
From Butembo, SYDIP organises farmers across the territories of North Kivu, through some of the most fertile and most contested land in the DRC.
Headquarters: the union's base and the seat of its congress, in North Kivu.
Peasant farmers organise SYDIP in Butembo to defend their interests across North Kivu.
An EU-supported agroecology programme trains hundreds of farmers across member organisations.
A new warehouse is handed to a member cooperative, letting farmers store and sell on better terms.
SYDIP takes the lead on a regional potato value chain reaching thousands of households.
The union's farmers meet again in Butembo for a thirty-first congress to renew their leadership and direction.
