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AGRICULTURE: Seed Treaty Boosts Farmers, Fails to Weed Out GM Crops

Stephen Leahy

BROOKLIN, Canada, Apr 15 2004 (IPS) - Poised to come into force in June, the international seed treaty represents the best hope for the protection of farmers’ rights and to stem the tide of patents on seeds, according to activists.

Earlier this month the treaty received the required level of international support – assent from 48 nations – to become law, after legislatures in 12 European states and the European Community (EC) assented to the agreement.

“It’s a historical moment,” says Kristin Dawkins of the U.S. non-governmental organisation (NGO), the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.

“We’ve turned the corner where trade and patent interests of corporations are everything in international agreements, to a treaty that reflects the interests of farmers and communities in the South.”

But the agreement, The International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, is not without flaws. For instance, it fails to prevent the patenting of seeds that have been genetically altered, Dawkins told IPS.

The accord is designed to ensure that the genetic resources of most of the world’s food crops are conserved and sustainably used, and that any commercial benefits from seed use are distributed equitably, including among farmers in the developing South.

The treaty will enter into force on Jun. 29, seven years after the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) launched negotiations.

The United States and Japan are among the nations that have not signed the agreement.

U.S. companies are among the largest agricultural firms in the world, and the United States is the world’s largest agricultural exporter.

“The treaty provides an international legal framework that will be a key element in ensuring food security, now and in the future,” said FAO Secretary Jose Esquinas-Alcazar.

“The challenge is now to ensure that the treaty becomes operative in all countries,” he added in a statement.

Since people began planting crops thousands of years ago, some 10,000 species have been used for food and fodder. Today, just 150 crops feed most human beings and just 12 crops provide 80 percent of food energy, with wheat, rice, maize and potato alone accounting for 60 percent.

Preserving the remaining genetic diversity is important in case of unpredictable environmental changes in the future, which could alter the production of current crops.

The treaty is intended to do that by enhancing access to genetic resources and the exchange of information, to technology, and by boosting scientific and technological capacity in plant breeding and biotechnology.

The agreement will also put in place, for the first time, a multilateral system for access to the crops and forages most important for food security.

Many countries now have various types of seed banks at academic, public and private institutions but many lack money to operate them.

In 2002 the Global Crop Diversity Trust was formed to raise 260 million U.S. dollars for seed conservation worldwide. On Mar. 12 the trust announced it had received commitments of 44 million dollars from countries and corporations.

The treaty’s multilateral system is also intended to ensure the fair sharing of benefits that would be derived from the use of crops’ genetic resources, in particular for farmers in developing countries that have for centuries contributed to the conservation of those resources.

Growers could receive, for example, shares of any monetary benefits arising from utilisation, including commercialisation, of new varieties by the private sector.

The details of exactly how benefit-sharing will function have yet to be worked out.

“Grassroots farmer organisations need to be involved in that process,” says Silvia Ribeiro of NGO, ETC Group.

The big benefit of the treaty is that farmers can continue to breed their own seed as they have done for millennia, Ribeiro said in an interview from the group’s Mexico City office.

“But the treaty will not stop the advance of GE (genetically engineered) crops.”

While the agreement prohibits the patenting of seeds, the United States and other nations have ensured that the treaty will not block the patenting of genetically engineered seeds, according to Ribeiro.

For instance, the accord would permit a company to take maize seed, insert a gene and patent it.

“Even though the U.S. has not signed the treaty, the sad reality is they had a great deal of influence on its outcome,” Ribeiro added.

On the other hand, the seed treaty could be used to probe some of the implications of GE crops, such as the contamination of farmers’ seeds and crops and whether that violates the agreement, she suggests.

In future meetings, the signatory countries could make the treaty’s patent prohibitions and farmers’ rights provisions stronger, according to Ribeiro.

The Intermediate Technology Development Group, a British NGO, welcomes the agreement but warns in a statement that it “will be just a piece of paper if it is not backed by substantial funds from the rich world to support conservation of seeds”.

Dawkins of the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy admits to some disappointment with the deal but says it is still the best international treaty yet.

“We’ve come a long way in seven years.”