At the sixth congress of the ruling Communist Party of Cuba, held in Havana Apr. 16-19, a proposal was adopted to include measures to guarantee the production, improvement and conservation of seeds within the country’s economic policy. Humberto Ríos, a scientist and researcher who works with farmers to promote agro-ecological practices that foster greater genetic diversity, told Tierramérica that this decision was “a very important advance” for the sector.

Producing and conserving seeds is “a major challenge that we have not properly addressed in the last 50 years,” he added.

Ríos, winner of the U.S.-based Goldman Environment Prize in 2010, stressed that “we will have to wait and see how this decision is put into practice, and if the local knowledge and type of agriculture practiced in each different place is taken into account.”