permaculture

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lfl@intrex.net>]

World Food Day: Iraqi farmers aren't celebrating
NEWS RELEASE For immediate release
http://www.grain.org/nfg/?id=253

When the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) celebrates biodiversity
on World Food Day on October 16, Iraqi farmers will be mourning its loss.

A new report [1] by GRAIN and Focus on the Global South has found that
new legislation in Iraq has been carefully put in place by the US that
prevents farmers from saving their seeds and effectively hands over the
seed market to transnational corporations. This is a disastrous turn of
events for Iraqi farmers, biodiversity and the country's food security.
While political sovereignty remains an illusion, food sovereignty for
the Iraqi people has been made near impossible by these new regulations.

"The US has been imposing patents on life around the world through
trade deals. In this case, they invaded the country first, then imposed
their patents. This is both immoral and unacceptable", said Shalini Bhutani,
one of the report's authors.

The new law in question [2] heralds the entry into Iraqi law of
patents on life forms - this first one affecting plants and seeds. This law
fits in neatly into the US vision of Iraqi agriculture in the future - that
of an industrial agricultural system dependent on large corporations
providing inputs and seeds.

In 2002, FAO estimated that 97 percent of Iraqi farmers used saved
seed from their own stocks from last year's harvest or purchased from local
markets. When the new law - on plant variety protection (PVP) - is put
into effect, seed saving will be illegal and the market will only
offer proprietary "PVP-protected" planting material "invented" by
transnational agribusiness corporations. The new law totally ignores
all the contributions Iraqi farmers have made to development of
important crops like wheat, barley, date and pulses. Its consequences
are the loss of farmers' freedoms and a grave threat to food sovereignty
in Iraq. In this way, the US has declared a new war against the Iraqi farmer.

"If the FAO is celebrating 'Biodiversity for Food Security' this year,
it needs to demonstrate some real commitment", says Henk Hobbelink of
GRAIN, pointing out that the FAO has recently been cosying up with
industry and offering support for genetic engineering [3]. "Most
importantly, the FAO must recognise that biodiversity-rich farming and
industry-led agriculture are worlds apart, and that industrial
agriculture is one of the leading causes of the catastrophic decline
in agricultural biodiversity that we have witnessed in recent decades.
The FAO cannot hope to embrace biodiversity while holding industry's
hand", he added.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:
> From GRAIN Shalini Bhutani in India [Tel: +91 11 243 15 168 (work) or +91
98 104 33 076 (cell)] or Alexis Vaughan in United Kingdom [Tel: +44 79 74 39 
34 87 (mobile)]
> From Focus on the Global South Herbert Docena in Philippines [Tel:+63 2  972 
> 382 3804]
NOTES [1] Visit
http://www.grain.org/articles/?id=6.
GRAIN and Focus' report is entitled "Iraq's new patent law: a declaration
of war against farmers". Against the grain is a series of short opinion
pieces on recent trends and developments in the issues that GRAIN works
on. This one has been produced collaboratively with Focus on the Global South.
[2] Patent, Industrial Design, Undisclosed Information, Integrated
Circuits and Plant Variety Law of 2004, CPA Order No. 81, 26 April 2004,
http://www.iraqcoalition.org/regulations/20040426_CPAORD_81_Patents_Law.pdf
[3] GRAIN, "FAO declares war on farmers, not hunger", New from Grain, 16 June 
2004,
http://www.grain.org/front/?id=24

Cricket Rakita
Seed Project Coordinator
Carolina Farm Stewardship Association
49 Circle D Dr.
Colbert, GA  30628
home/work:  (706) 788-0017
fax:  (706) 788-0071
cell:  (706) 614-1451
web:  http://www.savingourseed.org
email:  cricket@savingourseed.org