WOMEN & AGRICULTURE ACTION ALERT
Kathi Lawrence (klawrence@igc.apc.org)
Thu, 21 Apr 1994 10:38:06 -0700
URGENT URGENT URGENT URGENT
DRAFT DRAFT DRAFT DRAFT DRAFT
To: Those Interested in Women, Sustainable Agriculture and
Food Security
From: Kathy Lawrence
Facilitator
Women, Food and Agriculture Working Group
10 Prospect Place, Brooklyn, NY 11217 USA
Tel: 718-622-4314
Email: klawrence@igc.apc.org
Re: Statement on agriculture, food and rural development
for the April 22, Official Region II Preparatory
Meeting for the UN 4th World Conference on Women
Date: April 21, 1994
BACKGROUND
A group of concerned individuals recently set up a Women, Food
and Agriculture Working Group to work towards the 1995 Fourth
World Conference on Women and beyond. We are just beginning to
get things moving and welcome the participation of a broad range
of people.
Overall goals of the working group include:
- Ensuring that women's essential roles in achieving
agricultural sustainability and food security are understood,
supported and adequately addressed in the process leading up to
the World Conference on Women. (These issues are not currently
high on the official agenda);
- Promoting women's central role in sustainable agriculture
and food policy-making and implementation at all levels (local,
national and international);
- Encouraging and facilitating cross-fertilization among
various groups in all regions (e.g. women's networks,
sustainable agriculture networks, farmers and farm groups,
development practitioners, health/nutrition, hunger/food
security, environmental, labor and human rights organizations,
academia, government and UN agencies); and
- Ensuring that women's perspectives, vital contributions and
needs are represented in fora addressing food and agriculture
policy (e.g. UNDP and FAO agriculture policies and programmes,
Agenda 21 follow up at international and national levels, the UN
Commission on Sustainable Development, etc).
We hope to develop a broad-based and collaborative working group
that can tap into and reinforce ongoing activities and can use
the 1995 Conference as an additional channel to broaden access
to and exchange of ideas, information and possible cooperation
and action. We welcome active participation in the Working Group
and suggestions of other people who might be interested in
joining in this effort.
In the U.S. there are two series of regional meetings being planned
by the Labor Department Women's Bureau /State Department and by the
U.S. Council on INSTRAW to feed into U.S. preparations for the 1995
World Conference on Women. (dates, venue and contacts will be
posted separately.)
One of the first of these U.S. regional meetings will be held
tomorrow in New York City. This following text has been drafted to
raise the issues of agriculture, food and rural development and to
make some specific language recommendations. The document is based
on the text developed by NGOs (non-governmental organizations) for
the March 1994 meetings of the UN Commission on the Status of
Women, with additions and changes suggested by various groups.
We realize the time is very short for tomorrow's meeting, but
would like to make this effort. We view this as a work in
progress, to serve as a starting point for initiating dialogue
among women and men interested in these issues here in the U.S.,
and to feed into the other U.S. regional meetings to be held
later in the year.
Unfortunately, this document mirrors the government document style,
and is largely negative in focus. I hope that we can begin a
longer term process to include the positive alternatives, energy
and innovation that we hope to promote.
Thanks in advance for your prompt replies. I will be sending
out more information soon.
Kathy Lawrence
(For more information on the Women, Food and Agriculture Working
Group, contact Kathy Lawrence at the address and numbers above.)
1. Please review the following text
2. Please let me know asap TODAY via phone or email:
a) whether you are willing/able to sign on as
i. an individual
ii. an individual with organization listed for information
purposes only
iii. an organization
b) any changes or additions that would have to be made in order
for you to sign on.
**************************************************************
MISSING ON THE ROAD TO BEIJING:
AGRICULTURE, FOOD AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT
Agricultural is essential to both rural and urban development.
Food security is a basic human right that is inextricably tied
to agriculture and is a fundamental prerequisite for human
development. Yet these issues were almost totally ignored in the
Draft Platform for Action considered by government delegates to
the first preparatory meeting of the 4th World Conference on
Women.
It is noted in the Critical Areas of Concern (paragraph J.1.)
the quality and sustainability of the natural systems that
sustain life are of critical importance to everyone, and the
responsibility of everyone. Agriculture and food production
systems have implications for women's health and nutrition,
economic and legal status, training and education, employment
and the environment. However, the Strategic Objectives do not
even mention agricultural sustainability or food security or the
role of women in these issues that are essential to sustainable
development. These critical issues must be highlighted in the
Platform for Action.
Women the world over are actively engaged in producing food,
fuel and fibre as well as contributing significantly to
development of their local and national economies. Women must
also take a lead role in agriculture, food and rural development
policy formulation and implementation.
The undersigned individuals and organizations urge the U.S.
delegation to the 4th World Conference on Women to give priority
to these issues in the U.S. national report to the Conference
Secretariat, and invite U.S. delegates to engage in dialogue
with U.S. grassroots women throughout 1994 and 1995 on the
issues of agricultural sustainability, rural development and
food security.
Below are some specific recommendations for inclusion in the
Platform for Actin, followed by a description of the Women, Food
and Agriculture Working Group.
SUGGESTED CHANGES TO THE DRAFT PLATFORM FOR ACTION
4th WORLD CONFERENCE ON WOMEN
TO ADDRESS SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE AND FOOD SECURITY ISSUES
INSERT A NEW STRATEGIC OBJECTIVE:
To promote sustainable agriculture and food security
for all people and work to ensure that these issues
are addressed in a holistic manner and not
marginalized as solely "women's issues"
Global climate change, loss of biodiversity, misuse of
biotechnology, deforestation, soil degradation, desertification,
land air and water pollution seriously degrade the natural
resources necessary to sustain life and threaten food security.
Food security is defined in its most basic form as access by all
people at all times to the food needed for a healthy life. Food
security puts priority on food for domestic consumption over
food or products for trade, giving priority to locally produced
foods while preserving and protecting cultural food habits and
preferences. Food security, a basic human right, is
inextricably tied to sustainable agriculture and is a
fundamental prerequisite for human development.
Sustainable agriculture is a model of social and economic
organization based on an equitable and participatory vision of
development. Sustainable agriculture is a way of life where
communities have access to and control over their resources -
specifically land, water and seeds - and processes -
specifically marketing. Agriculture is sustainable when it is
ecologically sound, economically viable, socially just,
culturally appropriate and based on a holistic scientific
approach.
Sustainable agriculture preserves biodiversity, maintains soil
fertility and water purity, conserves and improves chemical,
physical and biological qualities of the soil, recycles natural
resources and conserves energy. Sustainable agriculture uses
locally available renewable resources, appropriate and
affordable technologies and minimizes the use of external and
purchased inputs, thereby increasing local independence and self
sufficiency and insuring a source of stable income for peasant,
family and small farmers and rural communities.
In much of the world, sustainable agriculture emanates primarily
from indigenous science and innovation, often developed by
women. However, the knowledge, skills and labor of women and
indigenous peoples remains invisible, undervalued, largely
unpaid and not reflected in economic statistics or the Gross
National Product.
To achieve agricultural sustainability and food security,
governments must:
1. Acknowledge the vital role of women in agriculture, promote
the leading role of women in policy formulation and
implementation, and provide appropriate channels for information
exchange in all aspects of sustainable agriculture and food
security.
2. Quantify and value women's unwaged work in agriculture and
food production and include this value in economic statistics,
the System of National Accounts and in Gross National Product.
Implement para. 24.8 of Agenda 21 calling for the integration of
the value of women's unpaid work in resource accounting
mechanisms.
2. Provide such infrastructure facilities as transport, storage,
markets, communication, child care, health care and family
planning services, safe potable water and fuel within easy
reach, afforestation and energy-saving devices to lessen the
burden of women farmers and enable them to participate fully in
the economic activities of their communities.
3. Adopt sustainable agriculture and national food security as
national policy and end subsidies that drive agricultural
unsustainability.
4. Retain the right to set stringent standards to protect
health, environment and food production and food security.
These critical issues must remain within national policy
formulation and not be governed by GATT or the proposed World
Trade Organization.
5. Oppose:
a) any global liberalization of food trade that
institutionalizes presently unjust terms of trade;
b) any effort of countries to dump food surpluses on other
countries;
c) any program to undertake production of cash crops at the
expense of local food production and livelihoods;
d) policies advocated within GATT and in individual countries
that seek to privately appropriate genetic capital and to patent
life forms such as plant, animal and human genetic resources.
6. Since women constitute a significant proportion of the
world's farmers and farmworkers and are the first to be exposed
to the ill-effects of pesticides and other agri-chemicals,
governments should undertake national policies to reduce and
ultimately seek to eliminate pesticide use by:
a) banning all hazardous pesticides including pesticides on the
WHO list of Class 1 pesticides, pesticides that cause or are
suspected of causing chronic health effects, pesticides that are
persistent in the environment or those that induce pest
resurgence;
b) banning the export and import of pesticides banned,
restricted, withdrawn or unregistered from the country of origin
or country of production;
c) implementing the FAO International Code of Conduct on the
Distribution and Use of Pesticides; and
d) banning the advertising of pesticides in the media.
e) encouraging the use of integrated pest management
Governments should cooperate with NGOs, farmers organizations
and women's groups to:
7. Provide support to farmers using sustainable practices and
enhance the diets of poor rural women and their children by
financing programs that promote use of sustainable, diversified
home gardens that provide both essential vitamins and income.
8. Research, document and promote positive example of regionally
and culturally specific sustainable agriculture programs and
practices.
9. Re-orient government research and funding decisions based on
priorities identified by small-scale farmers, especially women
and indigenous producers, emphasizing on- farm research and the
documentation and promotion of indigenous production systems.
10. Institutionalize farmers rights to and control over seeds
and genetic material.
11. Preserve remaining genetic resources and biodiversity by
such mechanisms as preserving local seeds, nurseries, livestock
and animals and participating in in-situ genetic reconstruction/
preservation efforts.
12. Recognize and protect the rights of minority farmers and
farmworkers, take aggressive action to redress discrimination
and neglect, and remove barriers to their expanded participation
in agricultural production. Expand outreach and technical
assistance programs delivered by minority farm organizations
commensurate with the crisis for minority farmers and
farmworkers.
NGOs should:
12. Provide support in organizing and strengthening rural
women's organizations.
13. Work to develop and strengthen democratic systems,
recognizing the important role of people-oriented development
models in achieving sustainable agriculture and food security.
14. Advocate for food security to be a central objective in the
agricultural and food policies of local and national
governments, international agencies, NGOs and community groups.
15. Identify existing and develop new educational materials that
meaningfully illustrate the ecological, social, cultural and
economic and political consequences of current policies and of
alternatives.
16. Organize new and support existing mechanisms for monitoring
policies and programs at local, national and international
levels of decision-making, and ensure that this information is
widely disseminated. Focus these efforts on the agricultural
policies of international institutions including the World Bank,
CGIAR, FAO, UNDP, GATT, IMF, and UNEP.
17. Monitor actions of governments in implementing commitments
made at the International Conference on Nutrition, the Earth
Summit (in particular Agenda 21), the Biodiversity and
Desertification Conventions and trade agreements.
This document draws extensively from:
- lans of Action, Asian and Pacific Symposium on NGOs on WID,
16-20 November, 1993, Manila, Philippines
- NGO Alternative Treaties on Sustainable Agriculture and Food
Security, negotiated in Rio de Janeiro, Brasil, June 1992
- Documents published by the Advocates for African Food Security
- Global Action Briefings, Between the Summits - Down to Earth,
Copenhagen 8-12 December 1993
- World Declaration and Plan of Action for Nutrition,
International Conference on Nutrition, Rome, December 1992