Members of Brazil’s Landless Workers Movement (MST) have occupied 12 farms in the state of Pernambuco, to try to pressure the government to speed up land reform. More than 5,000 families from the MST have moved on to the farms.
The MST say the Lula government had failed to live up to its election promises to have settled 400,000 families by 2007. The government has settled less than a quarter of that number. The land reform budget has been in order to repay debts.
Nearly half of all farmland in Brazil is owned by just 1% of the population. The MST occupies only unused land.