PVP in Africa

Bifurcated Carrots joins more than 80 other organizations around the world in opposing the new proposed PVP plant protection protocol in the SADC (Southern African Development Community).  This would spell disaster for small farmers and food security in the region.

3 April 2013
Civil society organisations from the SADC region, and around the world have condemned the SADC draft Protocol for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (Plant Breeders’ Rights) as spelling disaster for small farmers and food security in the region. These groups, representing millions of farmers in Africa and around the world have submitted their concerns to the SADC Secretariat. They are calling for the rejection of the Protocol and urgent consultations with farmers, farmer movements and civil society before it’s too late.

According to the groups, the Protocol is inflexible, restrictive and imposes a “one-size-fits-all” plant variety protection (PVP) system on all SADC countries irrespective of the nature of agricultural systems, social and economic development. It is modelled after the 1991 International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV 1991), an instrument which was developed by industrialized countries to address their own needs. UPOV 1991 grants extremely strong intellectual property right protection to plant breeders, and disallows farmers from continuing their customary practices of freely using, exchanging and selling farm-saved seeds.

According to Moses Shaha, regional chairman for the East and Southern African small-scale Farmers’ Forum (ESAFF): “The proposed legislation gives big-business breeders significant rights, but in doing so, disregards and marginalizes small farmers and their plant varieties. It fails to recognize that small-scale farmers and their customary practices of freely exchanging and re-using seed for multiple purposes, constitute the backbone of SADC’s agricultural farming systems.”

About half of SADC members are Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and are not currently under any international obligation to put in place any such PVP system. Indeed, the majority of SADC members have limited or no experience with PVP systems, or the impact these systems will have on food security, farmers, farming systems and livelihoods in the region.

According to Elizabeth Mpofu, a small farmer from Zimbabwe: “Small farmers in Africa play a vital role in keeping food costs down, and contribute immensely to the development of locally appropriate and adapted seeds, and to the diversity of crops. Any PVP system that fails to support and promote these farmer managed systems, and instead adversely impacts on them, is clearly a recipe for disaster for the region’s farmers.”

Like UPOV 1991, the Protocol is severely lacking in flexibilities to allow vulnerable states to address their particular socio-economic problems. The Protocol imposes a “one grant system” whereby the SADC Plant Breeders’ Rights Office will have the full authority to grant and administer breeders’ rights on behalf of all SADC members.

“This top-down approach effectively undermines the rights of SADC member states to take any decision related to the protected plant varieties; decisions that are at the very core of national socio-economic development and poverty reduction strategies. The Protocol also does not contain concrete measures to prevent misappropriation of plant genetic resources and does not live up to international commitments of the majority of SADC members to promote the sustainable use of plant genetic resources and plant breeding with the participation of farmers” pointed out Andrew Mushita, of the Community Trust for Development and Technology, in Zimbabwe.

“The whole rationale and underlying premise for the Protocol is unknown to us because we, as civil society, have been locked out of the process. What specific consultations have taken place, and with whom? What data and impact assessments have guided the development of the Protocol?” asks Mariam Mayet, of the African Centre for Biosafety.

Nelson the Adventurer

Nelson of the blog Nelson the Adventurer just left a couple of comments here, so I had a look at his blog.  It’s only a few months old, but looks really good.  Gardening and outdoor life in Australia.

Google Reader

feed_readers

This snapshot is from my site statistics, showing which news readers people use when viewing this blog, covering the last few weeks.  As I’m sure you can imagine, I’m a little concerned hearing Google is discontinuing Google Reader.

Since I don’t want to loose you all as readers, does anyone have any suggestions on what I can do to help you switch to something else?

In case you were wondering, this is why many people save their own seeds, to keep seed companies from causing problems when they discontinue varieties…

TabakNee

This is a new website in the Netherlands (Dutch language) that’s getting a lot of attention locally.

The website was set up by two lung specialists.  Their goal is to prevent tobacco use, in particular among young people, and to that end they want to openly discuss the tactics used by the tobacco lobby to achieve their goals.

An important part of the website, and what’s gaining the most attention, is their revealing all the known links between the Dutch government and tobacco industry.  It’s a very aggressive naming and shaming of the big players, and involves some very well known people in the country, like the Prime Minister and Minister of Public Health.

There’s been a remarkable change in this country in the last few years.  We’ve gone from almost no smoking controls, even to the extent that some school teachers smoked in front of the children during class, to a partial public smoking ban and active discussion of youth smoking. There’s even some discussion about going to plain cigarette packaging, like has just happened in Australia.

Even though an international treaty that Holland is a signatory of requires it, and some 80% of the country is in favor, we still don’t have a comprehensive public smoking ban!

There’s really increasing impatience with the smoking lobby here, and as the lung doctors who started the website point out, dealing with the tactics of the smoking lobby is really the first important step in dealing with the overall problem in the country.

This website is likely to be very effective here.  Already nearly all the important political parties and politicians have had some reaction to it, if only to say they don’t find it meaningful.  If a politician here says something like this website isn’t meaningful, that means they’re scared!  A couple of important political parties have come forward to say they agree with the goals of the website.

Holland is a small country, making something like this more effective than in a place like the US, where there are so many jurisdictions and politicians.  I still think something like this could help a lot in the battle against the food industry, almost anywhere in the world.

Anyone out there looking for a good project to get started on?