Commentary and analysis to persuade people to become socialist and to act for themselves, organizing democratically and without leaders, to bring about a world of common ownership and free access. We are solely concerned with building a movement of socialists for socialism. We are not reformists with a programme of policies to patch up capitalism.
Showing posts with label food sovereignty. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food sovereignty. Show all posts
Sunday, May 24, 2015
Food Sovereignty Ghana Opposes Monsanto
Food Sovereignty Ghana, a food advocacy movement, hereby serves notice to embark on a public march as part of a worldwide event comprising millions of marchers. This march is being organized in collaboration with the Kanyan Akuafuo Kuo Society, and is scheduled to take place in two locations: Accra and Goaso.
There are currently over 300 marches scheduled to take place around the world.
Out of respect to the Ga Traditional Council annual ban on drumming and noise making, which always precedes the Homowo festival, we have decided to organize a silent march in Accra and a more animated one in Goaso.
MISSION STATEMENT
On May 23, 2015, activists around the world will, once again, unite to March Against Monsanto.
WHY DO WE MARCH?
Research studies have shown that Monsanto’s genetically-modified foods can lead to serious health conditions such as the development of cancer tumors, infertility and birth defects. In the United States, the FDA, the agency tasked with ensuring food safety for the population, is steered by ex-Monsanto executives, and we feel that’s a questionable conflict of interest and explains the lack of government-led research on the long-term effects of GMO products. Recently, the U.S. Congress and President collectively passed the nicknamed “Monsanto Protection Act” that, among other things, bans courts from halting the sale of Monsanto’s genetically-modified seeds.
For too long, Monsanto has been the benefactor of corporate subsidies and political favoritism. Organic and small farmers suffer losses while Monsanto continues to forge its monopoly over the world’s food supply, including exclusive patenting rights over seeds and genetic makeup. Monsanto’s GMO seeds are harmful to the environment; for example, scientists have indicated they have caused colony collapse among the world’s bee population.
What are solutions we advocate for?
Vote with your cedis by buying organic and boycotting Monsanto owned companies that use GMOs in their products. Labeling of GMOs so that consumers can make those informed decisions easier. Rejecting the UPOV-compliant Plant Breeders' Bill Calling for further scientific research on the health effects of GMOs. Holding Monsanto executives and Monsanto-supporting politicians accountable through direct communication, grassroots journalism, social media, etc. Continuing to inform the public about Monsanto’s secrets. Taking to the streets to show the world and Monsanto that we won’t take these injustices quietly. We will not stand for cronyism. We will not stand for poison. That’s why we March Against Monsanto.
We will not stand for cronyism. We will not stand for poison.
For Life, the Environment and Social Justice!
from here
Saturday, March 28, 2015
The New Colonialism
This week the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and USAID
hosted a meeting in London with big agribusinesses to discuss strategies to
increase corporate control over seeds in Africa. The location of the meeting
was secret. So was the agenda. Attendance was strictly invite-only and nobody
who even came close to representing African small farmers was invited. Meanwhile,
farmers and food sovereignty activists met at the World Social Forum in Tunis
to discuss their solutions to the problems of our food system. These two
meetings represent not just two different types of meeting – a closed,
secretive meeting of the powerful versus an open, democratic meeting of
grassroots activists – but also two radically different paths for the future of
our food. One is based on corporate control and would generate vast profits for
a small elite; the second is centred on sustainable, democratic, local food
production.
As often was the case in colonial times, the corporate
agenda in Africa is today often disguised as paternalistic benevolence.
Friendly sounding projects such as the Alliance for the Green Revolution in
Africa, backed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the DfID
(Britain’s Department for International Development)-supported New Alliance for
Food Security and Nutrition promise to eliminate hunger by creating the
conditions that will bring new corporate technologies and more big business
investment to African agriculture. On
the face of it, that all sounds very good. So why this level of secrecy for the
meetings about the projects? Samwel Messiak, a Tanzanian food campaigner, tells
a very different story of the corporate agenda for Africa’s food. He told me that
in Tanzania the New Alliance has helped corporations ‘buy’ land off local
communities without their consent and without paying them compensation. This is
because the corporate agenda of AGRA and the New Alliance threatens to move
control of land and seeds into corporate hands. The push for corporate
engagement in Africa’s agriculture also has a strong focus on producing cash
crops for consumption in richer parts of the world (a practice started in
colonial times) which, if anything, provides less food for people living
locally. It seems strange that a supposedly charitable organization such as the
Gates Foundation is involved in this agenda; it seems they have swallowed the
idea that only the market can provide for our needs.
Some 600 million pounds in UK aid money is helping big
business increase its profits in Africa via the New Alliance for Food Security
and Nutrition. In return for receiving aid money and corporate investment,
African countries have to change their laws, making it easier for corporations
to acquire farmland, control seed supplies and export produce. Last year,
Director of the Global Justice Now Nick Dearden said:
“It’s scandalous that UK aid money is being used to carve up
Africa in the interests of big business. This is the exact opposite of what is
needed, which is support to small-scale farmers and fairer distribution of land
and resources to give African countries more control over their food systems. Africa
can produce enough food to feed its people. The problem is that our food system
is geared to the luxury tastes of the richest, not the needs of ordinary
people. Here the British government is using aid money to make the problem even
worse.”
Ethiopia, Ghana, Tanzania, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire,
Mozambique, Nigeria, Benin, Malawi and Senegal are all involved in the New
Alliance.
Agribusinesses are putting small-scale farmers under
pressure everywhere. In 2015 it shouldn’t be a radical notion to want to move
beyond colonialism and make sure farmers can keep control of the resources
needed to grow food to feed their communities. So it is more important than
ever that we stand with small farmers across the world to defend their right to
control their own land and their own seeds and our right to healthy local food.
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Casino Capitalism - 'Profiting From Hunger'
"Unfortunately, it's obvious that these promises were
outweighed by the desire to make a profit," the report's author, Clara
Jamart, a food security advocacy officer for Oxfam France, said.
According to Jamart, the funds assigned to agricultural
speculation have increased significantly over the last two years, climbing from
2.5 million euros ($2.9 million) in 2013 to 3.5 million euros ($4 million) in
2015.
"Excessive speculation in crop markets is exacerbating
food price volatility, and is depriving the world's poor of access to basic
foodstuffs," the latest report says.
After the dot-com bubble burst in 2001 and the 2007 housing
market crash, these investors started turning to agriculture as a safe
investment. During the G20 Agriculture Summit in June 2011, then French
President Nicolas Sarkozy called for a crackdown on commodity speculators,
likening them to the "mafia." In 2007 and 2008, dramatic spikes in
food prices — including an 87 percent increase in the price of cereal in 2008 —
triggered a global food crisis, leading to political instability and unrest in
many nations. Rising food costs sparked riots in Senegal, Indonesia, Egypt and
Haiti, where violent protests over the soaring cost of staple foods
precipitated the fall of the government in April 2008.
Oxfam explains that crops are often subject to "forward
buying; a process in which future harvests are traded." This practice
allows farmers who are at the mercy of crop prices to protect themselves from
price fluctuation on the futures markets. To do this, a farmer will agree to a
future price and delivery date for his crop, known as "futures,"
through an agreement brokered by an intermediary, known as a
"hedger." The hedger insures the farmers against a potential price
drop for the crop, but stands to gain if prices increase. Many believe that this
practice, which supersedes the law of supply and demand, causes artificial
spikes in food prices, which can have a devastating impact on the world's
poorest nations. For both Alessandro Stanziani, a professor and economic
historian at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris and
Oxfam, the blame lies with outside speculators — such as banks — that have
jumped into the agricultural markets to gamble on the future prices of staple
food crops, causing prices to increase.
805 million people — about one out of every nine individuals
worldwide — do not have enough food.
Friday, February 20, 2015
International Agroecology Forum to Address Food Sovereignty
Mali: La Via Campesina and allies host an International Agroecology Forum to address Food Sovereignty
More than 200 delegates, among them peasants, family farmers, fisher folk, pastoralists, indigenous peoples, agricultural workers, consumers, urban poor organizations, NGOs, academics and other social movements will be at the Nyéléni Centre in Mali from 24 to 27 February, to take part in the first International Forum on Agroecology. This forum takes places at a time where the world is facing economic crisis, the climate is changing, and the Mother Earth is being aggressively exploited by the corporate model of death and land grabbing.
According to La Via Campesina, agroecology is essential to humanity, since it builds autonomy and a better life for small scale food producers, produces more healthy food, provides a strong base for food sovereignty, and allows rural peoples to live in harmony with and take care of our Mother Earth. Peasant and small scale food producers’ agroecology is considered to be the model of life, of farms with farmers, of food producers with productive resources, of rural communities with families, of countryside with trees and forests.
According to Ibrahim Coulibaly, a leader of the National Coordination of Peasants Organizations (CNOP) in Mali, “this forum will bring practical responses, that will lead to concrete solutions on how agroecology can save the planet from hunger and climate change”.
Together with La Via Campesina, organizations such as More and Better (MaB), Movimiento Agroecológico de América Latina y el Caribe (MAELA), Réseau des organisations paysannes et de producteurs de l’Afrique de l’Ouest (ROPPA), World Forum of Fish Harvesters and Fishworkers (WFF), World Forum of Fisher Peoples (WFFP) and World Alliance of Mobile Indigenous Peoples (WAMIP) are co-organizers of the forum.
The Mali forum aims at exchanging local knowledge and know–how of farmers, sharing the innovations of peasants and small scale food producers, training materials and territorial processes to address the challenges of building an ecologically and socially just food system, as well as strengthening the synergies between the different small scale food producer organizations, social movements and other organizations promoting Agroecology.
from here
Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Democratising Food and Agricultural Research
Agricultural research for food sovereignty in West Africa
As part of the Democratising Food and Agricultural Research initiative
(see www.excludedvoices.org), a series of citizens’ juries have been held in Mali over the last seven years. Their aim was to allow ordinary farmers and other food producers, both men and women, to make policy recommendations after cross examining expert witnesses from different backgrounds. Three citizens’ juries explored the following themes:
1. GMOs and the future of farming in Mali.
2. What kind of knowledge and agricultural research do small scale producers and food processors want?
3. How to democratise the governance of food and agricultural research?
The citizens’ juries were guided by an oversight panel to ensure that the entire process was broadly credible, representative, trust-worthy, fair and not captured by any interest group or perspective.
Altogether, the farmer jurors made over 100 recommendations on the priorities and governance of agricultural research for West Africa. Recommendations covered issues such as models of agricultural production, land tenure and property rights, and food and agriculture markets, as well as issues of research funding, organisation, practice and governance.
In the follow up to this unique deliberative process, West African farmers asked to have a Policy Dialogue with the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) and its main donors. Farmers wanted a face-to-face discussion on research priorities with AGRA because it is a key player in setting the agenda for agricultural research for development in West Africa. This policy dialogue took place in Accra (Ghana) on 1st to 3rd February 2012.
The three-day event was chaired by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Olivier de Schutter, and was also attended by representatives of farming communities in Asia, East Africa and Latin America.
A video link with London allowed participation by UK donors and members of parliament. Both farmers and AGRA presented their vision for agricultural
research in Africa. Overall, farmers analysis and policy recommendations significantly differed from those promoted by AGRA.
For example, West African farmers were clearly against research that leads to the privatisation of seeds and proprietary seed technologies which allow companies to control the seed sector. They also felt that AGRA wrongly views farmers’ local seeds as unimproved, - thereby denying the plant breeding and seed selection work done by wo/men farmers.
Most notably, AGRA and the African farmers framed their respective research agendas within radically different visions of food and farming. The wo/men farmers argued that a vision of farming that de-links and separates crop production from other sectors (livestock, fisheries, forestry) is not acceptable. By prioritising crop production alone, AGRA is inducing an imbalance which farmers want to avoid in West Africa. Farmers reject AGRA’s development model and type of agriculture which, they feel , encourages bigger farms and the disappearance of small family farms, as well as the poisoning of the earth, water, and people. Instead, West African farmers called for a research
agenda that supports family farming and food sovereignty.
from here
As part of the Democratising Food and Agricultural Research initiative
(see www.excludedvoices.org), a series of citizens’ juries have been held in Mali over the last seven years. Their aim was to allow ordinary farmers and other food producers, both men and women, to make policy recommendations after cross examining expert witnesses from different backgrounds. Three citizens’ juries explored the following themes:
1. GMOs and the future of farming in Mali.
2. What kind of knowledge and agricultural research do small scale producers and food processors want?
3. How to democratise the governance of food and agricultural research?
The citizens’ juries were guided by an oversight panel to ensure that the entire process was broadly credible, representative, trust-worthy, fair and not captured by any interest group or perspective.
Altogether, the farmer jurors made over 100 recommendations on the priorities and governance of agricultural research for West Africa. Recommendations covered issues such as models of agricultural production, land tenure and property rights, and food and agriculture markets, as well as issues of research funding, organisation, practice and governance.
In the follow up to this unique deliberative process, West African farmers asked to have a Policy Dialogue with the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) and its main donors. Farmers wanted a face-to-face discussion on research priorities with AGRA because it is a key player in setting the agenda for agricultural research for development in West Africa. This policy dialogue took place in Accra (Ghana) on 1st to 3rd February 2012.
The three-day event was chaired by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Olivier de Schutter, and was also attended by representatives of farming communities in Asia, East Africa and Latin America.
A video link with London allowed participation by UK donors and members of parliament. Both farmers and AGRA presented their vision for agricultural
research in Africa. Overall, farmers analysis and policy recommendations significantly differed from those promoted by AGRA.
For example, West African farmers were clearly against research that leads to the privatisation of seeds and proprietary seed technologies which allow companies to control the seed sector. They also felt that AGRA wrongly views farmers’ local seeds as unimproved, - thereby denying the plant breeding and seed selection work done by wo/men farmers.
Most notably, AGRA and the African farmers framed their respective research agendas within radically different visions of food and farming. The wo/men farmers argued that a vision of farming that de-links and separates crop production from other sectors (livestock, fisheries, forestry) is not acceptable. By prioritising crop production alone, AGRA is inducing an imbalance which farmers want to avoid in West Africa. Farmers reject AGRA’s development model and type of agriculture which, they feel , encourages bigger farms and the disappearance of small family farms, as well as the poisoning of the earth, water, and people. Instead, West African farmers called for a research
agenda that supports family farming and food sovereignty.
from here
Friday, March 21, 2014
Total Marginalisation Of Small Farmers By Multinationals
GHANA’S PLANT BREEDERS’ BILL
The workshop discussed the key features of the Bill, noting that the Bill is modeled on the 1991 Convention of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV). It was noted that few developing countries are members of UPOV and of these most are members of UPOV 1978 and not UPOV 1991. It also emerged that the 1991 Convention is a restrictive and an inflexible regime that does not allow Ghana to develop a legal framework for plant variety protection that suits the agricultural conditions prevailing in Ghana.
The intellectual property agreement in the World Trade Organization (known as the TRIPS Agreement) allows Ghana to develop a ‘sui generis’ (of its own kind) system for plant variety protection. Ghana should use this flexibility to develop a plant variety protection/plant breeders’ regime that suits its national conditions as many developing countries have done. The bill pending in the Parliament fails to do that.
The Bill is unbalanced and inequitable. It strengthens breeders’ rights and does not reflect the interests and needs of the smallholder farmers that are the backbone of Ghana’s agricultural system. Breeders of new, distinct, uniform and stable varieties are given extensive rights under the Bill. On the other hand, the Bill does not accommodate the specific characteristics of farmer varieties and nor does it contain specific provisions that safeguards the interests of smallholder farmers such as their right to freely use, save, sell and exchange farm saved seeds.
The Bill only states that the minister shall in making regulations take into account the need to safeguard the legitimate interests of breeders and to permit farmers to make ‘personal use on their own holdings’ of farm saved seed. This is a very limited provision and it is simply unacceptable that it does not safeguard the interests of millions of smallholder farmers in Ghana.
It is also equally unacceptable that the Bill places the burden of enforcing the private rights of breeder on the state and taxpayer by criminalizing infringement of breeders’ rights.
The Bill also lacks safeguards that are important to protect public interest and to prevent misappropriation of Ghana’s genetic resources as well as to ensure fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of local germplasm.
The workshop also noted that the Bill has been developed without consultations with the wider civil society and smallholder farmer community.
The workshop noted that the Bill is inconsistent with Ghana’s obligations under the Convention on Biological Diversity and the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.
GHANA’S BIOSAFETY ACT
Ghana’s Biosafety Act is often referred to as the worst such law on the continent as it contravenes several provisions of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, an international environmental agreement to which Ghana is Party. This Protocol was negotiated by the international community to regulate genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in recognition that this technology is new and poses risks to the environment, human health and society.
The Ghana Biosafety Act allows the regulatory agency to grant exemptions that undermine the risk assessment and public consultation processes of the Biosafety Protocol. It also ensures that independent oversight of GMOs is near impossible by seriously limiting public access to information and participation in decision-making. The Ghanaian Act represents a permitting system to allow foreign corporations to sell their product rather than a Biosafety System designed to protect the health, environment and socio-economic well-being of Ghanaians. GMOs are designed for large-scale industrial farmers and have no place in Ghana’s agricultural system, which is based on small-holder farmers.
GHANA’S PLANT AND FERTILIZER ACT
Ghana’s Plants and Fertilizer Act, 2010, Act 83 in Part Two deals with seed regulation. It promotes/supports only industrial plant breeding and does not deal with smallholder farmer managed seed systems, the need for the conservation of land races and traditional varieties and ignores farmers’ rights. The entire orientation of the law is towards genetically uniform, commercially bred varieties in terms of seed quality control and variety registration. It creates an exclusive seed market for certified improved, commercial varieties of seed and excludes farmer varieties from this marketing system. The market for registered seed is not for African farmer breeders but for multinational companies. The implementation of this Act will result in the total marginalization of small farmers and their needs and is also setting the stage for thousands of small elite farmers who will be drawn into seed certification systems, which can later also be used for GM seed production in the near future.
From here
The workshop discussed the key features of the Bill, noting that the Bill is modeled on the 1991 Convention of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV). It was noted that few developing countries are members of UPOV and of these most are members of UPOV 1978 and not UPOV 1991. It also emerged that the 1991 Convention is a restrictive and an inflexible regime that does not allow Ghana to develop a legal framework for plant variety protection that suits the agricultural conditions prevailing in Ghana.
The intellectual property agreement in the World Trade Organization (known as the TRIPS Agreement) allows Ghana to develop a ‘sui generis’ (of its own kind) system for plant variety protection. Ghana should use this flexibility to develop a plant variety protection/plant breeders’ regime that suits its national conditions as many developing countries have done. The bill pending in the Parliament fails to do that.
The Bill is unbalanced and inequitable. It strengthens breeders’ rights and does not reflect the interests and needs of the smallholder farmers that are the backbone of Ghana’s agricultural system. Breeders of new, distinct, uniform and stable varieties are given extensive rights under the Bill. On the other hand, the Bill does not accommodate the specific characteristics of farmer varieties and nor does it contain specific provisions that safeguards the interests of smallholder farmers such as their right to freely use, save, sell and exchange farm saved seeds.
The Bill only states that the minister shall in making regulations take into account the need to safeguard the legitimate interests of breeders and to permit farmers to make ‘personal use on their own holdings’ of farm saved seed. This is a very limited provision and it is simply unacceptable that it does not safeguard the interests of millions of smallholder farmers in Ghana.
It is also equally unacceptable that the Bill places the burden of enforcing the private rights of breeder on the state and taxpayer by criminalizing infringement of breeders’ rights.
The Bill also lacks safeguards that are important to protect public interest and to prevent misappropriation of Ghana’s genetic resources as well as to ensure fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of local germplasm.
The workshop also noted that the Bill has been developed without consultations with the wider civil society and smallholder farmer community.
The workshop noted that the Bill is inconsistent with Ghana’s obligations under the Convention on Biological Diversity and the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.
GHANA’S BIOSAFETY ACT
Ghana’s Biosafety Act is often referred to as the worst such law on the continent as it contravenes several provisions of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, an international environmental agreement to which Ghana is Party. This Protocol was negotiated by the international community to regulate genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in recognition that this technology is new and poses risks to the environment, human health and society.
The Ghana Biosafety Act allows the regulatory agency to grant exemptions that undermine the risk assessment and public consultation processes of the Biosafety Protocol. It also ensures that independent oversight of GMOs is near impossible by seriously limiting public access to information and participation in decision-making. The Ghanaian Act represents a permitting system to allow foreign corporations to sell their product rather than a Biosafety System designed to protect the health, environment and socio-economic well-being of Ghanaians. GMOs are designed for large-scale industrial farmers and have no place in Ghana’s agricultural system, which is based on small-holder farmers.
GHANA’S PLANT AND FERTILIZER ACT
Ghana’s Plants and Fertilizer Act, 2010, Act 83 in Part Two deals with seed regulation. It promotes/supports only industrial plant breeding and does not deal with smallholder farmer managed seed systems, the need for the conservation of land races and traditional varieties and ignores farmers’ rights. The entire orientation of the law is towards genetically uniform, commercially bred varieties in terms of seed quality control and variety registration. It creates an exclusive seed market for certified improved, commercial varieties of seed and excludes farmer varieties from this marketing system. The market for registered seed is not for African farmer breeders but for multinational companies. The implementation of this Act will result in the total marginalization of small farmers and their needs and is also setting the stage for thousands of small elite farmers who will be drawn into seed certification systems, which can later also be used for GM seed production in the near future.
From here
Monday, August 19, 2013
Africa’s Food Sovereignty Under Attack By Corporate Interests
Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA), a coalition of
pan-African networks, with members in 50 African countries and
representing smallholder farmers, indigenous peoples and civil society,
met in Addis Ababa 12-16th August 2013 to formulate an action plan to
safeguard Africa’s sovereignty over its food, seeds and natural
resources from the assault on Africa’s food systems.
Africa’s diversity and knowledge systems are being threatened by corporate and genetically modified (GM) seeds, agro-chemicals, resource grabs and laws that prevent farmers from freely using, sharing or selling their seed.
These threats come from amongst others, the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) and the G8 "New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition" that strongly promote the interests of multinational seed, fertilizer and agro-chemical companies at the expense of the rights and interests of smallholder farmers.
Currently, 80% of seed in Africa is bred by smallholder farmers, who freely save and share seed, resulting in a wide diversity of agricultural crops and a safety net for food security. “We are outraged at the way African governments are being strong-armed into adopting draconian seed laws that ensure the dominance of corporate seeds; giving private breeders monopoly and exclusive marketing rights over seeds,” said Elizabeth Mpofu, from La Via Campesina Africa.
The entry point for corporate agribusiness into Africa is through valuable cash crops such as cotton. Bt cotton is promoted as necessary for African farmers to compete on the global cotton market. "Bt cotton production in Burkina Faso and South Africa has failed to achieve its promise. Small farmers are finding that yields and quality of Bt cotton are extremely low. For this reason Bt cotton planting this year has plunged from 400,000 hectares to 200,000 hectares in Burkina Faso." Fatou Batta, Association Nourrir Sans Détruire, Burkina Faso.
The G8 New Alliance places a heavy emphasis on nutrition that focuses almost exclusively on the bio-fortification of key staple crops. According to Bernard Guri from COMPAS Africa “Bio-fortification is a dangerous distraction from real solutions for nutrition such as increasing crop diversity. We cannot look to dependence on so-called ‘fortified’ crops, whilst ignoring the real socio-economic causes of malnutrition.”
The many pan-African networks belonging to AFSA all note with great concern the increasing acquisition of huge areas of African land by mining conglomerates and biofuel and export agribusiness. Smallholder farmers such as those displaced by these land grabs feed 70% of the world. Their model of agro-ecological family farming is the most efficient and productive in the world. We must support them instead of undermining their knowledge and practice" said Million Belay, Coordinator of AFSA.
from Grain
Africa’s diversity and knowledge systems are being threatened by corporate and genetically modified (GM) seeds, agro-chemicals, resource grabs and laws that prevent farmers from freely using, sharing or selling their seed.
These threats come from amongst others, the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) and the G8 "New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition" that strongly promote the interests of multinational seed, fertilizer and agro-chemical companies at the expense of the rights and interests of smallholder farmers.
Currently, 80% of seed in Africa is bred by smallholder farmers, who freely save and share seed, resulting in a wide diversity of agricultural crops and a safety net for food security. “We are outraged at the way African governments are being strong-armed into adopting draconian seed laws that ensure the dominance of corporate seeds; giving private breeders monopoly and exclusive marketing rights over seeds,” said Elizabeth Mpofu, from La Via Campesina Africa.
The entry point for corporate agribusiness into Africa is through valuable cash crops such as cotton. Bt cotton is promoted as necessary for African farmers to compete on the global cotton market. "Bt cotton production in Burkina Faso and South Africa has failed to achieve its promise. Small farmers are finding that yields and quality of Bt cotton are extremely low. For this reason Bt cotton planting this year has plunged from 400,000 hectares to 200,000 hectares in Burkina Faso." Fatou Batta, Association Nourrir Sans Détruire, Burkina Faso.
The G8 New Alliance places a heavy emphasis on nutrition that focuses almost exclusively on the bio-fortification of key staple crops. According to Bernard Guri from COMPAS Africa “Bio-fortification is a dangerous distraction from real solutions for nutrition such as increasing crop diversity. We cannot look to dependence on so-called ‘fortified’ crops, whilst ignoring the real socio-economic causes of malnutrition.”
The many pan-African networks belonging to AFSA all note with great concern the increasing acquisition of huge areas of African land by mining conglomerates and biofuel and export agribusiness. Smallholder farmers such as those displaced by these land grabs feed 70% of the world. Their model of agro-ecological family farming is the most efficient and productive in the world. We must support them instead of undermining their knowledge and practice" said Million Belay, Coordinator of AFSA.
from Grain
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