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Effects of pesticides on the right to food 2017, para. 107i
- Paragraph text
- [States should:] Create buffer zones around plantations and farms until pesticides are phased out, to reduce pesticide exposure risk;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Effects of pesticides on the right to food 2017, para. 107l
- Paragraph text
- [States should:] Regulate corporations to respect human rights and avoid environmental damage during the entire life cycle of pesticides;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 6
- Paragraph text
- The pressures on land are increasing dramatically. As rural populations grow, plots cultivated are becoming smaller per capita and per household. In India, the average landholding size fell from 2.6 hectares in 1960 to 1.4 hectares in 2000 and continues to decline; similar evolutions have been documented in Bangladesh, the Philippines and Thailand, where the decline in the average farm size is combined with an increase in landlessness. The trend is not limited to the Asian region. In Eastern and Southern Africa, the amount of cultivated land per capita declined by half over the past generation, and in a number of countries the average cultivated area now amounts to less than 0.3 hectares per capita. This phenomenon is compounded by erosion and soil depletion: worldwide, 5 million to 10 million hectares of agricultural land are being lost annually to severe degradation. And it would be difficult to expand the areas under cultivation to the degree required to accommodate the growth of rural populations, since forests have a major role in storing carbon and deforestation is already a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 7
- Paragraph text
- These long-term trends have been exacerbated in recent years by policies that have further increased the pressures on farmland. In many regions, under export-driven agricultural policies, large-scale plantations have developed for the production of food, energy or cash crops. While the tendency towards land concentration has resulted primarily from a dominant model of agricultural development that rewards the most mechanized and capital-intensive farms, it has also been encouraged by the expansion of long supply chains. This has generally favoured large agricultural producers, which are better connected to markets and can more easily produce the volumes and meet the standards required for export. The competition among various uses of farmland has recently been increased by policies favouring the switch to biofuels in transport, which leads to competing resource claims on the part of local resource users, Governments and incoming agrofuel producers, creating the risk that poorer groups will lose access to the land on which they depend. A recent inventory by the World Bank listing 389 large-scale acquisitions or long-term leases of land in 80 countries shows that, while 37 per cent of the so-called investment projects are intended to produce food (crops and livestock), agrofuels represent 35 per cent of such projects. For all these reasons, the Special Rapporteur has insisted that investments implying a shift in land rights should be treated with great caution. At the thirty-sixth session of the Committee on World Food Security, he will detail both the risks of large-scale land investments and possible alternative business models.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Environment
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 8
- Paragraph text
- Measures adopted with a view to climate change mitigation or environmental conservation, which have placed priority on technological and market-based solutions over the deconcentration of land in order to encourage more sustainable land uses, have created further conflicts with the rights of land users. Under the clean development mechanism provided for in article 12 of the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, annex I (industrialized) countries that have committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions receive additional emission credits if they help to implement emissions-reducing projects in developing countries. However, the planting of forests in order to benefit from the mechanism may result in evictions, against which the local populations concerned may be insufficiently protected. The REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) scheme, launched in 2005 and strengthened at the 13th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, convened in Bali in December 2007, may represent a threat to forest dwellers, whose customary rights over the forests on which they depend for their livelihoods are not widely recognized, if the State or other actors are tempted to appropriate the benefits derived from carbon sequestration. Governments are also working to protect natural environments by creating wildlife reserves, national parks and other protected areas. Ecosystems perform vital services for agriculture, including support of the soil structure and soil retention, nutrient cycling, dung burial and pest control, pollination, water provision and purification, biodiversity and atmospheric regulation. However, the implementation of conservation measures, including land-use planning, should take into account the right to food of people who depend on the land for their livelihoods.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 29
- Paragraph text
- The poverty-reducing potential of more equitable land distribution is further illustrated by statistical analyses showing that "a decrease of one third in the land distribution inequality index results in a reduction in the poverty level of one half in about 12-14 years. The same level of poverty reduction may be obtained in 60 years by agricultural growth sustained at an annual average of 3 per cent and without changing land distribution inequality". Land reforms in Asia following the Second World War resulted in a 30 per cent increase in the incomes of the bottom 80 per cent of households, while leading to an 80 per cent decline in the incomes of the top 4 per cent.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Poverty
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 33
- Paragraph text
- The most recent pledges to pursue land reform were made at the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development of FAO, convened in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in March 2006. The Final Declaration adopted at the Conference encourages the holding of a national and inclusive dialogue to ensure significant progress on agrarian reform and rural development and the establishment of appropriate agrarian reform "mainly in areas with strong social disparities, poverty and food insecurity, as a means to broaden sustainable access to and control over land and related resources". The Governments represented at the Conference also recommended that the FAO Committee on World Food Security adopt of a set of reporting guidelines in order to monitor the implementation of the Declaration.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 34
- Paragraph text
- The preparation of the Voluntary Guidelines on Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land and other Natural Resources, led by FAO, is the single most important attempt to follow up on the commitments made at the Conference, and the Declaration of the World Summit on Food Security, held in 2009, underlines that link. It is too early to assess the Guidelines in the light of what they promise to achieve. At the regional level, however, the African Union's Framework and Guidelines on Land Policy in Africa are an important step in that direction, and the Latin American project to follow up on the Conference, launched in August 2009, involves a large number of countries in the operationalization of the commitments set out in the Declaration. But the overall picture remains uneven across regions.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 35
- Paragraph text
- It can be argued that part of the reason for this mixed outcome, lies in the strongly ideological overtones of the debate about how to implement land reform. Over the past generation, the major divide has been between centralized, or State-led, agrarian reform, effectuated through State land acquisitions compensated at below-market prices, and decentralized, or market-led, agrarian reform, based on the principle of a willing buyer and a willing seller. Although State-led agrarian reform has become less common, FAO continues to receive requests for assistance regarding such reform, and certain countries are still redistributing land or have committed to doing so. Since the 1990s, however, there has been a trend towards market-led agrarian reform, as illustrated by programmes such as the Cédula da Terra project, launched in Brazil during the period 1996-2001 and since renewed; the Colombian programme developed under Agrarian Law 160 of 1994; the South African Reconstruction and Development Programme, launched in 1994; the Community-Based Rural Land Development Project in Malawi; and the voluntary land transfer scheme in the Philippines.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 38
- Paragraph text
- While State-led agrarian reforms can generally be quite effective in addressing deeply entrenched inequalities in access to land provided certain conditions are met, market-led agrarian reforms have been less successful in that regard, sometimes even leading to the reconcentration of land, for reasons similar to those that explain the limits of titling as a means to ensure security of tenure. Important lessons can be drawn from past experiences: the success of State-led land reform programmes depends not only on effective land ceiling laws and other appropriate safeguards, such as legal frameworks that clearly define beneficiaries and exempted land, but also on continued social mobilization by peasant organizations, which can be vital partners in the implementation of policies to provide support to new beneficiaries. However, if the redistribution of land is to be sustainable, the beneficiaries must also be supported through comprehensive rural development policies. It has been estimated that improving access to credit and markets, as well as rural extension, can account for 60 to 70 per cent of the total costs of a land reform, exceeding the costs of acquiring and transferring the land. The failure of Latin American reforms when compared with Asian reforms has been attributed to the fact that Latin American reforms have traditionally focused solely on access to land, neglecting rural development policies. In order to be successful, land redistribution must be accompanied by broader agrarian reform policies that support smallholders and improve their ability to compete against larger farms; otherwise, there will be strong incentives for land reform beneficiaries to sell their land to large landowners. Women should be prioritized in such programmes, as under the Young Farm Women's Training Programme in the Canadian province of Manitoba or in the strategy currently being developed in Norway by the farming sector and the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, aimed at achieving 40 per cent participation by women in agriculture. Land ceiling laws can also help. Although such laws are often circumvented by large landowners - for example, by registering land under the names of proxies - they can increase the amount of land available for redistribution to the poorest households and limit the risk of land reconcentration following reform. A similar result can be achieved by subjecting land transactions to administrative authorization, which enables the administration to object to transactions that would lead to the unacceptable concentration of land, as in Germany under section 9 (1) of the Land Transactions Act.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 41a
- Paragraph text
- [In order to protect the right to food, States should:] Conduct decentralized mapping of various users' land rights and strengthen customary systems of tenure. Mapping should be performed at the level of the local community and in a participatory manner. While customary systems of tenure may receive legal recognition, public authorities should ensure that appropriate safeguards are established in order to ensure that control by the community will not be exercised arbitrarily or in ways that lead to discrimination or inequitable outcomes, in keeping with international norms and standards. States should establish appropriate mechanisms for the resolution of land conflicts between landlords and tenants, between land users and the State or between private-sector entities involved in development projects;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 42a
- Paragraph text
- [In order to ensure the enjoyment of the right to food, States should:] Implement the conclusions set out in the Final Declaration of the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development and prioritize "improved" State-led land redistribution programmes. States should implement land redistribution programmes where a high degree of land ownership concentration (which could be defined as a level of inequality higher than a Gini coefficient of 0.65) is combined with a significant level of rural poverty attributable to landlessness or to the cultivation of excessively small plots of land by smallholders. Redistributive agrarian reforms should: (a) include comprehensive rural development policies that follow the recommendations resulting from the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development, including extension systems, access to credit and agricultural research and support beneficiaries, provided with sufficient budgets; (b) make use of land ceiling laws and be based on legal frameworks that clearly define beneficiaries and exempted land; (c) encourage communal ownership systems, rather than focusing solely on individual beneficiaries; (d) be implemented in accordance with the principles of participation, transparency and accountability, in order to prevent their appropriation by local elites; (e) be grounded in constitutional provisions regarding the social functions of land, where such provisions exist. All States should monitor land inequalities before and after the implementation of such programmes;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 42b (i)
- Paragraph text
- [In order to ensure the enjoyment of the right to food, States should:] Ensure that market-led land reforms are compatible with human rights. If, despite the reservations expressed in the present report, States choose to seek to improve security of tenure through titling programmes and the creation of land rights markets, they should: Regulate such markets by taking appropriate measures to prevent increased land speculation, increased land concentration, abuse of customary forms of tenure by new landowners, and distress sales by indebted farmers;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 42b (iv)
- Paragraph text
- [In order to ensure the enjoyment of the right to food, States should:] Ensure that market-led land reforms are compatible with human rights. If, despite the reservations expressed in the present report, States choose to seek to improve security of tenure through titling programmes and the creation of land rights markets, they should: Prioritize the titling of land for those who are dependent on land for their livelihoods and are more vulnerable to land-grabbing, rather than for those who claim to be the formal landowners;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 43a (i)
- Paragraph text
- [The Special Rapporteur also makes the following recommendations to the international community:] Establish adequate governance instruments to operationalize the commitments set out in the Final Declaration of the International Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development. The Voluntary Guidelines on Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land and other Natural Resources could make a significant contribution, provided that they: Encompass land redistribution issues in addition to land administration issues, consistent with the Conference commitments;
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Access to land and the right to food 2010, para. 43c
- Paragraph text
- [The Special Rapporteur also makes the following recommendations to the international community:] Governments investing in farmland abroad should ensure that they do so in accordance with their human rights obligations. They should regulate the conduct of private actors on which they can exercise an influence, thus helping to protect the human rights of the communities concerned. Similar obligations exist for development banks funding projects that have an impact on land rights (see A/HRC/13/33/Add.2, para. 5);
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2010
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 7
- Paragraph text
- Firms transfer responsibilities for labour management to farmers through contract farming, and labour costs may be lower because contract farmers often use unpaid family workers. Furthermore, firms using contract farming arrangements can maintain more fluid operations because they are not constrained by fixed assets. These are some of the reasons why, for instance, contract farming with smallholders has been seen as an attractive option in India for companies in the horticultural, poultry and dairy sectors. Although transaction costs are relatively high, this model spreads risk over a large number of suppliers (the buyer, therefore, is not at risk if any one major supply source defaults) and provides for flexible supply that adapts easily to volume or quality variations.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 22
- Paragraph text
- While the ability of buyers to purchase inputs at wholesale prices might allow them to pass savings on to farmers through lower prices, it may also be that when a farmer has access to inputs only through a buyer, the buyer will charge farmers higher than market prices for those inputs. In the course of consultations, the Special Rapporteur received a communication indicating that in the absence of public services, contract farming can create potentially devastating dependence by small farmers on the technology, credit, inputs and services provided by their contracting companies. This not only points to the danger of the Government relinquishing its duty to support farming communities by providing adequate public goods in the hope that private investors will fill in the gap, it also highlights one of the main negative effects of contract farming for farmers, which is its potential to trap them in cycles of debt. One common occurrence is that farmers must borrow money to invest in agricultural production as required under the contract and then do not earn enough money to cover their debts, for instance, because of falling market prices or poor harvests. This risk is particularly important where the investment on the land is related specifically to one type of production for which the contracting firm is the only buyer, a constraint that may be exploited by the firm as a way to exercise monopolistic power and thus gradually impose lower prices on farmers. Crops that rely on complex production and processing technologies and substantial specialized inputs that are unfamiliar to most growers and require large capital outlays significantly increase the level of risk confronted by growers, as illustrated by the Smallholder Sugar Authority and Smallholder Tea Authority contract-farming schemes in Malawi. The resulting cycle of debt can trap farmers into contractual arrangements that are neither optimal nor easily abandoned, either because of the debt itself or for other reasons, for example, because the soil was degraded by heavy pesticide use or because farmers have lost their relationships with former transaction partners, are unable to re-establish traditional cultivation methods or products or have become too dependent on the firm for other services.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 24
- Paragraph text
- Under such clauses, firms may reject delivered products by stating falsely that they do not conform to quality regulations, thus transferring financial losses to farmers when market prices are low. Firms can manipulate prices when the price mechanism specified by the contract is not transparent, using complex price formulas, quantity measurements or price measurements. They also can manipulate delivery schedules to benefit from market price changes or from changes in a product's qualities upon which prices are based (for example, delaying the purchase of sugar cane when prices are based on sucrose levels because sucrose levels decline rapidly after harvest).
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 26
- Paragraph text
- The arrangement must be viable for all the parties concerned. If it appears unviable to the buyer, the contract may be terminated or the buyer may renege on obligations when under financial stress, with detrimental consequences for the livelihoods of farmers. If the arrangement is unviable for the farmer, for instance because of an unsustainable debt, the buyer may face supply problems in the short term and incur high reputational costs with other farmers, which may make it more difficult for the buyer to enter into arrangements with other producers in the longer term. Agreements should be structured so that both farmers and firms benefit and so that both sides desire to respect the contract and do not have strong incentives to renege on it.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 33
- Paragraph text
- Contract farming rarely encourages farmers to climb up the value chain and move into the packaging, processing or marketing of their produce. The purpose of contract farming is to organize a division of labour between the seller and the buyer in which the seller is confined to the production of raw commodities. In addition, all the strategic decisions - about what to grow and how to grow and about which markets to target - are with the buyer. The producer is merely the executor. Finally, in contract farming, the interests of the two parties differ: while both have an obvious interest in the success of the arrangement, the terms of the contract will be more or less favourable to each, at the expense of the other. Other business models, therefore, should be explored.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 38
- Paragraph text
- Farmers (generally through their organizations) and private investors may establish joint ventures, with each party contributing in cash or in kind. Such business models ensure, in theory, that both sides are equal partners and are co owners of the project. Both sides hold equity shares in the joint venture, while retaining their individual legal status and sharing in profits or losses made by the joint venture. Enabling farmers to be shareholders allows them to influence company governance and negotiate price policy, to share in the benefits (whether profit is reinvested or distributed as dividends) and to improve access to credits and other farm-related services.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 40
- Paragraph text
- MBSA is another promising joint venture model, focusing on the production of biodiesel from jatropha in collaboration with smallholders in Burkina Faso and Mali, with support from Dutch private institutional investors and the Government of the Netherlands. In Mali, 2,611 farmers were involved in 2009, having planted 1.6 million jatropha trees on 3,250 ha of land. The farmers are organized in 12 cooperatives, joined in a farmers' union. The union negotiates the price of the jatropha with MBSA and provides support to the farmers. The farmers' union is represented on the board of the company and owns a 20 per cent share of the company. The farmers, therefore, benefit directly from the sale of their produce and from dividend payments as shareholders.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 45
- Paragraph text
- In the City of Durban/eThekwini Municipality, with a population approaching 4 million people, a new Agricultural Management Section within the municipality seeks not only to support community food gardens, but also community mini-farms and emerging commercial farms. The municipality identified 26 farmers' associations and 800 community gardens and aims to improve market linkages with the urban residents. It is estimated that, provided that there is adequate support, such gardens could generate 60,000 jobs. One key objective for the municipality is to become increasingly self-sufficient in fresh and affordable food through surplus sales to the urban centre. The Agricultural Management Section established six hubs to pursue this strategy - in effect, centres to support local farmers and improve their ability to market their produce, including sites demonstrating agroecology techniques, a research and development centre on agroecology, training sites, a packing and marketing hub and, in the future, a seed bank.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 51
- Paragraph text
- Governments should ensure that the degree of competition among traders is sufficient to prevent farmers from being locked into unequal relationships with a particular trader in the absence of alternative buyers for a given crop. In particular, Governments should ensure that the expansion of contract farming does not result in the dismantling of public support schemes and the privatization of agricultural extension services, which would narrow the range of options available to small-scale farmers and increase the asymmetry of power between unorganized small-scale farmers and private actors operating on a national, regional or global scale.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Human rights criteria for making contract farming and other business models inclusive of small-scale farmers 2011, para. 55
- Paragraph text
- Development partners and international organizations can ensure that contract farming schemes work for the benefit of the poor small-scale food producers and respect the principles of the right to adequate food, including by increasing the capacity of community-based organizations to negotiate equitable agreements with the private sector, by contributing to financing equity participation by local communities in joint ventures or by supporting farmer-controlled enterprises to acquire the assets and managerial skills necessary to climb up the value chain, as initial support is frequently needed to start businesses that will become self-sustaining.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Acroecology and the right to food 2011, para. 12
- Paragraph text
- Agroecology is both a science and a set of practices. It was created by the convergence of two scientific disciplines: agronomy and ecology. As a science, agroecology is the "application of ecological science to the study, design and management of sustainable agroecosystems." As a set of agricultural practices, agroecology seeks ways to enhance agricultural systems by mimicking natural processes, thus creating beneficial biological interactions and synergies among the components of the agroecosystem. It provides the most favourable soil conditions for plant growth, particularly by managing organic matter and by raising soil biotic activity. The core principles of agroecology include recycling nutrients and energy on the farm, rather than introducing external inputs; integrating crops and livestock; diversifying species and genetic resources in agroecosystems over time and space; and focusing on interactions and productivity across the agricultural system, rather than focusing on individual species. Agroecology is highly knowledge-intensive, based on techniques that are not delivered top-down but developed on the basis of farmers' knowledge and experimentation.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Acroecology and the right to food 2011, para. 14
- Paragraph text
- Agroecology is a coherent concept for designing future farming systems as it is strongly rooted both in science and in practice, and because it shows strong connections with the principles of the right to adequate food (Section III). It can be seen as encompassing - or closely related to - approaches such as "ecoagriculture" and "evergreen agriculture," while the concepts of "ecological intensification" and "conservation agriculture" often follow certain agroecological principles. Agroecology is also linked to the "ecosystem approach to sustainable crop production intensification" recently supported by the FAO Committee on Agriculture (COAG). Discussion of the detailed differences among these concepts is beyond the scope of this report.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Acroecology and the right to food 2011, para. 15
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- Crop breeding and agroecology are complementary. For instance, breeding provides new varieties with shorter growing cycles, which enable farmers to continue farming in regions where the crop season has already shrunk. Breeding can also improve the level of drought resistance in plant varieties, an asset for countries where lack of water is a limiting factor. Reinvesting in agricultural research must consequently mean continued efforts in breeding. However, agroecology is more overarching as it supports building drought-resistant agricultural systems (including soils, plants, agrobiodiversity, etc.), not just drought-resistant plants.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Water & Sanitation
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Acroecology and the right to food 2011, para. 21
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- By enhancing on-farm fertility production, agroecology reduces farmers' reliance on external inputs and state subsidies. This, in turn, makes vulnerable smallholders less dependent on local retailers and moneylenders. One key reason why agroecology helps to support incomes in rural areas is because it promotes on-farm fertility generation. Indeed, supplying nutrients to the soil does not necessarily require adding mineral fertilizers. It can be done by applying livestock manure or by growing green manures. Farmers can also establish a "fertilizer factory in the fields" by planting trees that take nitrogen out of the air and "fix" it in their leaves, which are subsequently incorporated into the soil. That, in essence, is the result of planting Faidherbia albida, a nitrogen-fixing acacia species indigenous to Africa and widespread throughout the continent. Since this tree goes dormant and sheds its foliage during the early rainy season at the time when field crops are being established, it does not compete significantly with them for light, nutrients or water during the growing season; yet it allows a significant increase in yields of the maize with which it is combined, particularly in conditions of low soil fertility. In Zambia, unfertilized maize yields in the vicinity of Faidherbia trees averaged 4.1 t/ha, compared to 1.3 t/ha nearby, but beyond the tree canopy. Similar results were observed in Malawi, where this tree was also widely used. The use of such nitrogen-fixing trees avoids dependence on synthetic fertilizers, the price of which has been increasingly high and volatile over the past few years, exceeding food commodity prices, even when the latter reached a peak in July 2008. In this way, whatever financial assets the household has can be used on other essentials, such as education or medicine.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Environment
- Food & Nutrition
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
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