NGO
Another Way (Stichting Bakens Verzet), 1018 AM
01. E-course : Diploma in
Integrated Development (Dip. Int. Dev)
Edition
06: 11 January, 2011.
Edition
07 : 27 September, 2011.
Study points
: 06 points out of 18.
Minimum study
time : 186 hours out of 504
The points
are awarded only on passing the consolidated exam for Section B :
Solutions to the Problems.
Fifth block : How
the third block structures solve specific problems.
Study points : 02 points out of 18
Minimum study time : 54 hours out of 504
The
points are awarded only on passing the consolidated exam for Section B :
Solutions to the Problems.
Fifth block : How
the third block structures solve specific problems.
Section 4: Food crisis. [5 hours]
02.00 Hours analysis of Model
material.
02.00 Hours in-depth analysis.
01.00 Report.
Section 4: Food crisis. [5 hours]
In-depth analysis.
(At last two hours).
Human Right to Adequate Food
There are international conventions guaranteeing adequate food as a human
right, where “every man, woman of child, alone or in a community with others,
has physical and economic access at all times to adequate food or means for its
procurement ”. On
the human rights aspects of monocultures, see Suárez S., Emanueli M, Monocultures and
human rights, Food First
Information and Action Network (FIAN),
Local food independence.
The inhabitants of integrated development project
areas sustainably cultivate and local store the foods necessary for their
survival. They do this through the use
of eco-sanitation installations for the recycling of their urine and composted
faeces, thereby supplying the fertilisers necessary for the production of their
own foods. The urine is added to household grey water . The grey water and the
urine together provide enough liquid to cover family requirements, even in
times of drought.
Project areas under the Model undoubtedly enjoy a
greater resistance to droughts and other crises than most other communities.
However, they cannot offer total guarantees against disaster.
For example, recommended solar pumps work at total
heads up to
Under conditions of extended drought for 2-3 years,
reserves of harvested rain-water will have run out. There will be no surface
water available, and perhaps no water left in rivers. The only water available
to the inhabitants will be the
The recommended solar pumps also have the feature that
they can be installed at any depth below the level of the water in the
borehole. It is therefore possible to take strong fluctuations in the water
level in the borehole into account to cover situations of severe water
draw-down during the day in conditions of slow borehole replenishment. However,
where night-time replenishment becomes insufficient to compensate for extra
drawings during the day, the quantity of water pumped must be reduced either by
turning the PV arrays out of the sun or by reducing the number of pumps in
operation. As users start receiving less than
Plant nurseries will be set up under the local money
system created by the project. Tens of thousands of fruit and vegetable oil
trees will be planted in the project area. The trees will take several years to
sink deep roots and create relative immunity from drought conditions. Once they
have done this they will form a second source of food in hard times.
1.
Opinion.
«There is no reason why the world’s
populations, even the poorest, cannot enjoy an adequate food supply». Give a
one page, critical, commentary on this statement assuming that all of the
structures to be provided in an integrated development area are in operation.
Food security : world monopolies.
In this section GMO means «Genetically modified organisms ».
French speaking readers can read the
problems raised by GMO crops, Attac
63, Commission OGM, 2003, Conférence Riom, 11 Février 2003.
The following is a translation (T.E.Manning) from pages 7 and 8) :
« 5.1 DEPENDENT AGRICULTURE
« Farmers have become dependent on
large-scale seed distributors, even for conventional seeds. Conventional hybrid
seeds have a lower yield as early as the second generation. The farmer has to buy
seeds, and of course, they cost more. For example, the cost of hybrid maize
seed is thought to be 100 times that of grain maize. With GMO crops, this strategy of industrial
control takes on a new face. Patents deposited on transgenic plants legally forbid all re-utilisation of the
seeds (whether or not hybrids) from one year to another. This leads large
companies (especially Monsanto) to :
« · employ private detectives to track down cases
of fraud
· have farmers (Mr. Percy, in
· To reduce the cost of private detectives and legal
action, where possible make fraud impossible, through the TERMINATOR
technology, which, perfected by the biotechnology company Delta &
It is clear that when any farmer who works in a formal
money system becomes dependent on a multinational supplier, his chances of
getting out of the supplier’s clutches are reduced.
2.
Opinion.
Prepare a one-page manifesto of the
risks linked with multinational seed companies. You can distribute it amongst
the farmers in your project area.
Actual distribution of the manifesto is worth bonus points for your
report.
The Attac document continues on pages 8 and 9 (translation T.E.Manning)
« 6 BIODIVERSITY AND PATENTS ON LIVING ORGANISMS
« At WTO level, article 27-3 of the Agreement on Trade-related
Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights), signed in Marrakech in
1994, forces signatory countries to accept patent rights on micro-organisms and
vegetal species (living organisms).
European Directive 98/44/CE,
on the legal protection of biotechnological interventions adopted in July 1998
by the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament allows GM products to
be patented. It was to have gone into force in
« Member
states (Netherlands, Italy and Norway, supported by France and Germany)
appealed to the European Court of Justice claiming violation of the Convention on Biological
Diversity, Rio de Janeiro, June 1992, an
international treaty recognising the sovereignty of countries over their
natural resources and protecting
biodiversity in general, and on the basis of incoherence and contradictions
with other European Directives and regulations, amongst which Directive 90/220/CEE,
on the dissemination of GMO in the environment and the patents Convention
itself, which limits the patentability of living organisms for ethical reasons
and for the protection of research activities.
Directive 98/44/CE,
introduces a blending of invention with discovery, authorising patents on genes
in general and patents on the genes of traditional plants in particular. How
can anyone claim to invent a gene which has been present in nature for
centuries? The self-proclaimed inventor
is simply stating that it already exists ! ».
A lot of information is available on the efforts of civil society to
fight attempts by multinational companies to steal the genetic characteristics
of plants and animals for their own benefit.
One of the world leaders of this movements in Dr Vandana Shiva, research
manager at the Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, New Delhi. Read
for example her article The Basmati Battle and its
Implications for Biopiracy and Trips , Global Research,
French readers should read Milanesi J. et al, Analyse des coûts induits sur
les filières agricoles par les mises en
culture d’organismes génétiquement modifiés (OGM) Etude sur le maïs, le soja et le poulet
Label Rouge, Centre
d’étude et de Recherche en Gestion Université de Pau et des Pays de l’Adour, in
association with Greenpeace, October 2008
Their conclusion at page 51 reads:
«In a single
market, where GM maize and non GM maize were both to available for purchase as
alternatives, their prices would be the
same and the surcharges and constraints generated by the production of non GM
maize would be passed on along the production line through farmers and
distributors. This situation would not be viable and the production
of non GM maize would be condemned to disappear.»
Read :
The future of seeds and food,
Then C. and Tippe R., The International Coalition of “No Patents on Seeds”
April 2009.
« In sum, the report shows a threatening
scenario. It describes the potential takeover of plants’ genetic resources by
international companies, which would then be able to control access to the most
important resources for conventional breeding and the whole food chain. Seeds,
plants and food patents granted on a grand scale could significantly impact
food prices and availability, and could become an additional factor
contributing to upcoming global food crises.
Furthermore, because small-scale producers in
developing countries rely on the right to save seeds from their harvest and to
exchange them with other communities, the freedom to do this is crucial for the
future of food security. In order to halt these threatening developments it is
not enough to wait for patent offices to reject single patent applications or
to file more individual oppositions in this field. What is needed most is a
clear legal ruling that exempts seeds and farm animals from patent
protection. » (Then & Tippe op.cit. p.4)
«Patents on basic methods in plant breeding, such as
genetic fingerprinting, QTL and MAB, can be applied on an undefined and large
group of plant species. They are a perfect tool for systematic bio-piracy, as
they enable the patent holder to turn global commons, essential for food
production, into private property by simply describing them using technical
means. Many of these patents are nothing but well-organised theft and global
robbery supported by patent offices and certain political institutions in
industrialised countries........ The only way to protect the centres of
biological diversity from being pirated in this way by international companies
is to issue a clear regulation in patent law, excluding all patents on
conventional breeding of plants. The development of bio-piracy can no longer be
sustainably and effectively controlled by single opposition
procedures. » ( Then & Tippe, op.cit p.23)
« [In] patent application WO 2008150892,
‘the patent on monsantoizing food feed fuel’ , the company claims
breeding for soy beans with an oil content of between 23 and 35 %, which have
been derived from conventional breeding and combined with transgenic traits,
such as herbicide resistance. Monsanto claims the plants and their derived food
products, listing the whole chain of production in the claims. For example
claim 7 reads:
“A method of producing food, feed, fuel or an
industrial product comprising the steps of:
(a) obtaining seed from the plant ...
(b) planting and growing the seed into mature plant
(c) harvesting seed from the mature plant; and
(d) preparing food, feed, fuel or an industrial
product from the harvested seed.”(Then & Tippe op.cit p.24)
In «Failure to Yield – Evaluating
the Performance of Genetically Engineered Crops » (Union
of Concerned Scientists, Cambridge MA
(USA), April 2009), author D. Gurian-
Summary of the present situation with
genetically modified crops.
For an up to date report on the status of
genetically modified crops world wide read : Who benefits from gm crops :
the great climate change swindle, Riley P. et al, Friends of the
Earth International, Food sovereignty, issue 17, Amsterdam, September 2010.
Read GM crops increase pesticide use and fail to alleviate
poverty published by Friends of
the Earth (Europe),
“…the widespread adoption of Roundup Ready crops
combined with the emergence of glyphosate-resistant weeds has driven a more
than 15-fold increase in the use of glyphosate on major field crops from 1994
to
“….genetic engineering has not increased the yield
potential of any commercialized GM crop (Fernandez-Cornejo & Caswell, April
2006).” (p.12)
Read
the Special Report :
Are Regulators dropping the ball on bio-crops? by Gillam C., published by Reuters
on 13 April 2010, Columbia 2010
The author states :
“Farmers around the world seem
to be embracing biotech crops that have been altered to resist bugs and
tolerate weed-killing treatments while yielding more. According to an industry
report issued in February, 14 million farmers in 25 countries planted biotech
crops on 330 million acres in 2009, with the United States alone accounting for
158 million acres.”
and highlights the lack of
effective control over the use of genetically modified crops because :
“The developers of these crop
technologies, including Monsanto and its chief rival DuPont, tightly curtail
independent scientists from conducting their own studies. Because the companies
patent their genetic alterations, outsiders are barred from testing the biotech
seeds without company approvals.”
On recent attempts by Monsanto
to gift its way into the Haitian market, see Bell B, Haitian Farmers Commit to Burning Hybrid Seeds, CommonDreams.org,
There are some recent signs
of a more attentive approach by the
Courts, especially in the United States. See, for instance, Federal Court orders
first-ever destruction of a GMO crop a Press Release by the Center for Food Safety,
San Francisco, 30 November 2010
Theft of agricultural lands (land-grabbing)
“The act of landgrabbing fits in well in a
strategy towards deepening the commoditization of nature, agriculture and the
global rule of a small group of “investors” and the TNCs [trans-national
corporations] ….. Since foreign land acquisition is profit-oriented and largely
exports-driven, it will foster the introduction/deepening of an industrial mode
of production in the host countries. There is abundant literature available
indicating that that mode of production is destructive and not sustainable.” (Odeny
E. et al (eds), Landgrabbing in
Kenya and Mozambique, Food
First Information and Action Network (FIAN), Heidelberg, April 2010. (p. 39)
“A state which does not provide available land
and related production resources to the marginalized, but instead hands these
lands to rich investors does not comply with these obligations [those of the
International Covenant of Economic,
Social and Cultural Rights]” Odeny E. et
al (eds), Landgrabbing in
Kenya and Mozambique, Food
First Information and Action Network (FIAN), Heidelberg, April 2010. (p. 38)
“ There are over 2,500 bilateral investment treaties
(BITs), which protect [land-grabbing] investors from changes to host government
policy and which may be impairing the ability of countries to regulate
investments effectively. The opportunity for investors to challenge public
policy through arbitration procedures under these BITs weakens developing
countries’ capacity to regulate their food, land, and water sectors, as well as
to introduce policies that promote food security and poverty reduction.”
(Zagema B., Land and Power : The growing
scandal surrounding the new wave of investments in land, Oxfam
Briefing Paper 151, Oxfam, Oxford, 22 September, 2011, ISBN 978-1-84814-947-2, p.
38.) This Oxfam document is a
well-referenced denunciation of land-grabbing practices.
Food security in large towns.
The principles of
the Model apply to urban centres as well as rural areas. Execution of
integrated development projects in rural areas takes priority of those in urban
areas. The purpose of this is to increase the quality of life in rural areas
first, so as to stop and if possible
reverse migration to the larger towns.
Students with a
knowledge of French can read Arm
towns against hunger – ed. Koc M. et al, Centre de Recherches pour le
Développement International, (CRDO),
“Conclusion :
recommended development measures and
strategies
The present study shows availability of
resources is the basis of urban agriculture, which offers an excellent
potential for development. In urban centres in developing countries the
structured economic sector is generally under-developed. It does not allow
urban populations to reach adequate income levels. Urban agriculture can enable
families to earn income and protect themselves against food insecurity.
Decision makers should therefore take the following recommendations into
account:
1. Strengthen rural development.
2. Provide for resource management based on
mutual support.
3. Decentralisation.
4. Careful urban management.
5. Improve water supply in urban areas.
6. Encourage composting and waste management in
urban areas.
7. Support agriculture and gardening programmes
in urban environments.
8. Support and carry out research on vegetables
and indigenous cultures.
9. Provide services to small urban operators.
10. Reinforce the role of
women.
11. Support existing gardens
and other forms of ground use for agricultural purposes, such as animal rearing
and rainy season cultivations.
12. Carry out research on and
offer services for the spreading of information on the sustainable use of wild
food resources.”
3. Opinion.
Give a two/page account on how the concepts in the Model for integrated
development projects answer each of the twelve recommendations made. Write a
short introduction , follow it with 12 short paragraphs, and end with your
conclusions.
Arm towns against hunger (
cited above) also contains an analysis by Nugent R. on «The degree of
sustainability of urban agriculture”.
The author writes (translation T.E.Manning):
« .....urban
agricultural products are carried over short distances ( to a producers´ market
or to a local grocery) or need no transport at all ( sold on the spot at the
farm or by self-harvesting). Thanks to this, packaging and energy consumption
can be reduced. Locally produced foods
are sold directly to consumers or, when they are given to family members,
friends and neighbours, not at all. »
4. Opinion.
Why then can the food industry compete? Explain this on one page. You
might wish to refer to the First Block : Section 1. Analysis of the causes of poverty of the
course.
5. Opinion.
The efforts
to achieve world-wide monopolisation of the food sector (patents, Basmati rice etc.)
described above and the failure of organisations such as the World Trade
Organisation and the European Commission to deal with them seem to be in
conflict with Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
(1948) article 1 of
which reads «All human beings are born free and
equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and
should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood. .. » What
is your opinion ? (One page)
◄ Fifth block : Section 4: Food Crisis.
◄ Fifth
block : How fourth block structures solve specific problems.
◄ Main index for the Diploma in Integrated Development (Dip.Int.Dev.)
Money is not the key that opens the gates of the market
but the bolt that bars them.
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licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-commercial-Share Alike
3.0 Licence.