Activists want seed law reviewed

By Michael Odeng

FOOD security activists have asked legislators to review the recently passed Plant Variety Protection Bill, saying it entrenches the rights of breeders and companies while curtailing the rights of small farmers.

The activists argued that the Bill curtails farmers’ abilities to exchange, save and breed new varieties using hybrid seeds.

Frank Muramuzi, the executive director of National Association of Professional Environmentalists (NAPE), said the Bill protects interests of multinational seed manufacturers at the expense of ordinary farmers.

“The Bill leaves certain forms of traditional seeds became scarce, threatening the biodiversity of the country as well as the financial viability of farming for the rural poor.” Muramuzi said. 

He was speaking on Monday at Forest Cottages in Ntinda during the legal training of stakeholders and coalition member’s campaign against mining impacts on food, water, sacred natural sites and territories in Uganda.

He said, “The parliamentarians passed the Bill without consulting civil societies or small scale farmers in their respective regions who are likely to be if it’s passed into law.”

Muramuzi said the Bill threatens food sovereignty especially for rural women who may rely on farm saved foods to provide for their families, adding that it puts farmers in a dependency cycle.  

He said it gives authority to the seed producing companies to control the supply of such seeds on the market, hence food insecurity. “This also gives them a chance to cheat farmers with costly patented seeds on the market and at the end many farmers will be kicked out of agriculture thus exposing citizens to hunger.” 

Gaia Foundation Uganda executive director, Liz Hosken criticized the way mining of most minerals in the country was being done, saying the miners were dumping wastes into water bodies thereby polluting them.

Hosken urged government to develop strategies that promote earth Jurisprudence-based community governance of ecosystems (laws governing nature) in order to revive indigenous knowledge and practice.

She said the drafted Biosafety and Biotechnology Bill, 2012 undermines the importance of liability and does not protect the environment and water bodies, hence threatening food security.

Plant Variety Protection Bill was passed by Parliament this year but has not yet been assented to the President.  

Parliamentarians claim the Bill promotes improvements in the productivity, profitability, stability and sustainability of cropping systems through yield enhancement and maintenance of plant varieties.

They further said it promotes appropriate mechanisms for a fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the use of plant varieties, knowledge and technologies including the provision of institutional mechanisms for the effective implementation and enforcement of the rights of breeders.

While, Activists claim it leaves out the legitimate rights of farmers and community at large, threatens to impoverish Uganda’s poor small farmer, household, national food security and biodiversity.