The World Seed Conference: Good for farmers?

Last week marked a little-known and under-reported symposium held in Rome under the auspices of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation – the World Seed Conference. Although the subject may appear obscure, the conference theme and the issues discussed, including plant variety protection and seed improvement techniques, could not be more important to millions of farmers in the developing world.

Between the heavy acronyms and technical terms used by the UN figures, government officials and industry representatives, the conference illustrated two clear themes; firstly, the desire of Northern-based business to continue a process of enclosure of key farming inputs such as seeds by way of technology. Secondly, a push by these same companies (supported by the US and EU countries) for an extension and tightening of intellectual property rights on plant genetic resources into the national law of poorer countries.

Under the guise of innovation and progress, breeding companies suggest that seed varieties developed in laboratories in the North and then sold to poorer farmers in the South can raise yields in crops, increase nutritional values, reduce pesticide and fossil fuels use as well as conserve biodiversity. In the words of one participant at the conference, his company utilised ‘the art and science of changing the genetics of plants for the benefit of humankind.’

Advocates from industry argue that to safeguard their investment in these manipulated ‘seed innovations’ governments should use a form of legal construction (intellectual property rights) to prevent farmers from re-using and changing seeds that are a ‘product’ of agribusiness. Industry lobbyists also suggest that such monopoly rights should extend to developed plants varieties that business cannot easily control by technology – for example due to natural reproduction.

However, the patenting of seeds, extension of plant variety protection and rollout of a global regime of intellectual property rights for agricultural inputs could have serious consequences for small-scale farmers in the developing world.

Techno-Fixes and Monopoly Control

Firstly, the intellectual property regime that many participants in the Conference wish to tighten and extend to poorer countries (what one participant called ‘the development of a new industry competitiveness on foreign markets’), legally prevents farmers from sharing and saving seeds for later harvests or for future generations.

Under a key intellectual property treaty first signed in the 1960s and last amended in 1991, called UPOV, and the later WTO TRIPS, governments agreed to prevent farmers from saving or sharing seeds with only a few limited exceptions. In countries that have accepted these intellectual property regimes, small-scale farmers have moved increasingly towards the use of imported seeds, suffering from a number of adverse effects including increased debt levels, displacement and worsening food security. Making the situation worse, under intellectual property laws, some governments refuse to subsidise or even prohibit the use of seeds that do not make an ‘official list’ – most often those that were previously shared and exchanged between communities.