Family Farming and Return Migration in the New Politics of Ecuador: The Case of the Plan Tierras y de Retorno Productivo

This text analyses policies concerning family farming and migration in Ecuador. It is based on a research carried out in Ecuador and Spain in the period 2014-2015, through the analysis of documents and around 15 semi-structured interviews with key informants, as officers, experts, migrants, various leaders and representatives of non-governmental organizations (NGOs). In Spain interviews were conducted in Murcia, where co-development projects were promoted by local actors and Ecuadorian Government in the past years. Here migrant organizations are mobilizing around the Ayalán project. This project is part of the Plan Tierras y de Retorno Productivo and it aims to sustain migrants in Spain). Five of the 14 associations promoted by migrants in Spain, to participate in the Ayalán project, are based in the Murcia Region. The research revolves around two main questions: first, in what terms the new Ecuadorian policies are able to enhance peasant family farming and innovative development models ; second, in what extent the return migrants are involved in the territorial development dynamics, as well as in the management and empowerment of the territories. The paper is organized in four sections. The first one deals with family and peasant farming in the food sovereignty and Buen vivir perspectives. The second section is dedicated to the question of migration within institutional discourses and policies. The third section deals with the Plan Tierras, the national program promoting access to the land for small producers and sustaining family farming. The fourth section analyzes the Ayalán project and the involvement of migrants in it.