5th Meeting of the European Seed Network 'Let's liberate diversity!' Volkshaus, Graz, Austria, 25-27 March 2010 The year 2010 will be decisive in the debate about intellectual property rights concerning seeds. The EU wants to pass seed legislation that is uniform throughout Europe. In the future, will just industrial varieties be available on the seed market while regional and farmers varieties will be found only in museums and show gardens? All signs indicate that seed corporations are using the revision of the seed law to expand their power further. The EU directive on conservation varieties and non-industrial varieties complicates or forbids the propagation of old varieties due to geographic and quantitative restrictions. In the last few years, seed initiatives in many European countries have teamed up and organized across borders under the banner of “Let's liberate diversity!”. They are defending farmers' rights to sow seeds from their own harvest, to breed them and to pass them on. European seed initiatives from ten countries have prepared counterproposals and want to vote on them together in Graz as well as make connections in the European-wide network of resistance. This year's meeting is taking place in Austria in order to strengthen cooperation with Eastern European countries, yet everyone who is interested in the subject and who would like to become active is invited. The 5th meeting will be hosted by four Austrian associations: Arche Noah, ÖBV – Via Campesina Austria, Longo maï and MaiMun. Simultaneous translation will be available in German, English, French and Spanish. On Friday, 26 March 2010, we are organizing a Market of Diversity with a seed exchange, presentations, exhibitions, diverse products for sale, workshops, music and organic food. The topic of seeds will be publicized through “Sowing the future” actions that will make effective use of the media.
SOME OF THE WORKSHOPS:
Workshop 1 Revision of the EU-seed legislation framework: Exchange of experiences concerning the European directive on conservation varieties, cultivation bans, the common positioning paper of the network. What actions will we take towards national and European authorities? The FAO? The international contract ITPGR-FA? (Guy Kastler, RSP, F) Workshop 2 Seeds in eastern Europe: Reports from Slovenia, Hungary, Romania, Turkey, ... How is the crop diversity that still exists threatened? Where is farm seed being used and who is defending it? (Csilla Kiss, Protect the Future, H) Workshop 3 Seeds and migration. Diversity for everyone? Immigrants and refugees were often able to preserve their favourite varieties to a new land. Without them, our everyday meals would be monotonous and bland. Come and bring experiences, examples and ideas about how we can reproduce seeds and open-mindedness collectively. (Florian Walter, Kathrin Schickengruber, A)
Workshop 4 Actions and campaigns: What is being done in different countries as a reaction to the revision of the European seed legislation? What are we doing together? The campaign “Sowing future – harvesting diversity” will be introduced. (Jürgen Holzapfel, European Civic Forum, D) Workshop 5 Patent laws and alternatives: Seed patents and conservation of varieties are increasingly restricting farmers' rights and breeders' work. In this workshop, we will provide information about current patent rights cases and point out alternatives (Eva Gelinsky, IG-Saatgut, Pro Specie Rara, CH; Gebhard Rossmanith, Bingenheimer Saatgut AG, D) Workshop 6 Livestock breeding: Forced vaccinations, maximum productivity and the limitation to only a few selection criteria and breeds create problems for livestock breeders. How do we want to breed? How can we create a European network of resistance? (Antoine de Ruffray, Longo maï, F) Workshop 7 Agriculture: Monocultures, the use of large amounts of chemicals and specialisation in only a few industrial varieties and breeds are all destroying natural and cultivated diversity. Which agricultural forms of production preserve biodiversity? (ÖBV-Via Campesina Austria)
13:00 Compagnie MaiMun: Street theatre on the subject of seeds Lunch at the Market of Diversity Beginning at 10 am: Market of Diversity and public program in "Augarten": seed exchange, plants from seed savers and farmers, local food, exhibits, additional workshops and information. Saturday, 27th March 9:00 Closing plenary: How will we carry on? The structure of the European network, the location of the next meeting, evaluations, discussion.
The outcome of this meeting was the following declaration:
From March 25. to 27, 2010, 160 representatives of the European seed networks gathered in Graz, Austria, for the 5th European Seed Meeting “Let’s Liberate Diversity!”. They included groups that work on the conservation, use and distribution of plant diversity, civil society organizations, gardeners, breeders, and men and woman farmers from over 20 countries. For the first time, the conservation of livestock diversity was discussed in the context of this meeting, since diversity loss is also very advanced within animal husbandry. A declaration on livestock diversity is annexed to this text. Graz Declaration: Freedom for Diversity Each human being has the right to live without hunger and to eat adequately. This human right includes access to productive resources, in particular seeds. In the long term, Food Sovereignty can only be achieved through a culturally rich, ecological food production, based on locally-adapted varieties and on the collective care and development of this diversity. For thousands of years, people all over the world have been creating livestock and crop diversity. This bio-cultural diversity emerged on our planet as a reciprocal process between human beings and nature, in many localities, through pastoralist grazing and over long periods. The fact that people all over the world have access to it is fundamental for our daily bread and for the food sovereignty of all peoples and communities. This diversity is an elemental part of the human right to food; it must remain a common good, belonging to everyone. We defend farmers’ rights to obtain seeds from their own harvests, to breed them and to distribute them. Farmers’ Rights are not respected and run the very serious risk of being further curtailed through current revisions of European seed legislation. Ten companies already control 67% of the international commercial seed market and are demanding that their intellectual property rights be expanded in order to increase their profits and to impose industry varieties throughout the world. Varieties capable of being re-sown are systematically displaced from the market. But it is not these companies’ varieties that will best feed the world in the future. A diversity of small farming practices is needed, including locally-adapted varieties. We recall that three-quarters of men and women peasants all over the world produce their own seeds, exchange and sell them. Yet European laws seek to relegate these heirloom and regional varieties to a small and controlled niche. We demand that patents on plants and animals, their traits and genes, as well as patents on breeding methods be prohibited without exception and that the control of companies on biodiversity be constrained. The continuing plunder of the foundations of world food production must be stopped. A true change can only take place when in Europe a fundamental change in food, trade, and agricultural policies, as well as farmers’ rights, as defined in the UN international seed treaty, are implemented. We demand: the right to obtain seeds from our own harvest, to re-sow, distribute and sell them; the promotion of diversity in all regions by supporting conservers and breeders of varieties that can be re-sown; the prohibition of genetic modofication technologies in agriculture; the prohibition, without exceptions, of patents on plants and animals, their traits and genes, as well as patents on breeding methods; a new agrarian policy, which, instead of supporting energy-intensive industrial production and monocultures, promotes biodiverse and ecological production.
These demands are directed toward Member States and the European Institutions. The participants of the 5th European Meeting in Graz, March 2010. In referring to „Farmers’ Rights“, we include gardeners and all those who in one way or another cultivate plants.
Conclusion of the IAASTD report (International Assessment of Agriculture, Science and Technology for Development).
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