Diversity Equity and Inclusion

In our work towards a just and resilient food system, free from harmful pesticides, PAN North America centers the principles of justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion. These principles guide our actions, our relationships, and our pursuit of knowledge and understanding.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Statement of Principle:

PAN North America is committed to prioritizing justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion in our work at the interpersonal, organizational, and systemic levels. This commitment is a collective process and journey that involves the entire organization. We work to build mutual dignity and address injustice in the world while ensuring those injustices are not replicated within PAN.

• We actively listen to individual perspectives and we honor each person’s lived experience.
• We commit to be mindful of power, rank, and privilege, and hold ourselves and each other accountable to naming that power, and to modeling responsible, inclusive leadership.
• From our mission to our tangible work, we name and challenge systemic and structural racism.
• We acknowledge that we work within the context of the history of the United States which includes the genocide of Indigenous peoples; slavery; dispossession of land and territory; systemic oppression of African Americans, Indigenous communities, immigrant communities, and people without access to land and just labor conditions; the industrialization of farming; and the commodification of resources.
• We also acknowledge the present oppression of Black, Indigenous, and other peoples of color; gender non-conforming individuals and the LGBTQ+ community as a whole; people with disabilities; religious minorities; people living in poverty; and unhoused individuals. We commit ourselves to striving for justice for all who experience oppression.
• We model behaviors we want to see in the world in our own communities.
• We actively center our work with the communities and voices most directly affected by the issues on which we are advocating.
• We show up in our values through our actions, both as representatives of our organization, and within our organization.
• We work against the economic power dynamics that prioritize profit over both people and nature.
• We commit to the ongoing examination of our own biases, assumptions, categorical thinking, or “othering” in every aspect of our work, and we will work to always improve our language, approach, care, beliefs, and practice in light of that examination.
• We commit to holding space for courageous conversations, and to working through tension in healthy ways by actively listening to each other and being mindful of how to promote and support a joint understanding of dignity, respect, and justice.
• We view justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion not as aspirational goals, but as crucial components of our daily work.

The mission of PAN grew from an understanding of the historical inequities that have shaped global food and farming systems, food sovereignty, worker rights, and the agrichemical industry. Our task is to stand in solidarity with the movements of people affected by agrichemicals—including those who stand up for nature herself—to support access to the resources, tools, political education, networks, and community connections needed to advance change that reforms our relationship to agrichemicals, farming, public health, and ecosystem integrity—locally to globally.

This means that internally, we must create an organization that not only provides value to our core constituents, but also cultivates the conditions for shared power, and generates trust, consent, and mutual solidarity across a diverse group of partners. Across our entire staff and through each team we must uphold the importance of justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion as fundamental to our work and our lives. We understand that a staff comprised of diverse and wide-ranging backgrounds, experiences, and talents is critical to the solidarity, reach, and effectiveness that we offer to the movements with whom we work. We commit to standing up for others when we witness injustice in the workplace and in the world around us.