[TLDR (too long didn’t read): If you are reading this, chances are you care about HR. This Reader is about the never-ending struggle for this right and how many of us think the UN is failing us. For a quick overview, just read the bolded text].
–Hunger exists, not because how difficult it is to satisfy the hunger of those rendered poor, but because it is impossible to satisfy the greed of the those rendered rich.
-When unilateral coercive measures cause widespread hunger (and deaths), they may amount to crimes against humanity under article 7 of the Statute of the International Criminal Court.
So perhaps the United Nations tried to do something about it… It called for a Food Systems Summit (FSS)
1. But unfortunately, the October 2021 UN FSS assembled the components of food systems as though they were beads strung together one after another, and treated the handling of the grave social and human rights (HR) trade-offs as if this were bluffing in a poker game, i.e., totally ignoring the evidence that social constituencies desperately tried to bring-in-to-the-discussions showing the burning reality rooted in the daily experience of claim holders worldwide. Result: On the road-to and the outcome-of the FSS, the fear of reality-as-a-valiant-arm-to-fight-false-narratives won.* (N. McKeon)
*: Perhaps the needed connectedness to build sufficient political power of isolated and separated producer and consumer constituencies brought about by the prevailing market-induced divisiveness was unable to muster sufficient muscle. Muscle against the populist, nationalist and the ‘we-they’ discourse the TNCs invited by the FSS convener (and the UN Secretary General) deceivingly sold to UN member states at the FSS. We now need to build this connectedness starting with community-level work. But now it is a must that this claim holder convergence be politically effective so as to a) build a bottom-centered common understanding of the threats posed by the FSS-led corporate capture of the agricultural and food/beverages retail economy, and b) stimulate and bring about common action against it –all this based on HR as the legitimate and accountable space responsible for setting the rules and regulations of private sector action –making sure they are accountably respected. (N. McKeon)
[I will not dwell in more details here on what the Summit unfortunately did not end up doing. You can read all about the position public interest CSOs and social and indigenous people’s movements unsuccessfully took vis-à-vis the FSS in the following link:
The right to food and adequate nutrition goes beyond kilocalories
2. Every individual should have permanent access to a healthy, nutritious and culturally acceptable food. Parallel action should also be taken in the health, education and sanitary infrastructures in addition to improving food security. (FAO)
3. In relation to the latter, I ask: Why does FAO shy away from rather focusing on the challenge of improving food sovereignty?** [I ask, because we absolutely need to get UN agencies to resolutely stand by HR and the right to food and thus adopt the already widely accepted concept of food sovereignty which they have shunned-from so far].
*: A reminder here: Food security is the measure of the availability of food and individuals’ ability to access it meaning that all people, at all times, have physical, social, and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that meets their food preferences and dietary needs for an active and healthy life. The availability of food irrespective of class, gender or region is another of its tenets. Food sovereignty pertains to a food system in which the people who produce, distribute, and consume food also control the mechanisms and policies of food production and distribution; this stands in contrast to the present corporate food regime, in which corporations and market institutions control the global food system. Food sovereignty emphasizes local food economies and markets, sustainable food availability; it centers on culturally appropriate foods and practices. (We know it was La Via Campesina that, in the 1990s, introduced the concept as an alternative to food security).
4. This said, let us look at how to apply food sovereignty in practice (as a center-piece in the fulfillment of the right to food) still poses some difficult questions.
Food sovereignty: How an in-the-box idea falls into deaf ears or disappears from the radar of UN agencies (Challenges thrown open in the Journal of Peasant Studies)
5. How, then, is the concept of food sovereignty to replace the more outdated notion of food security? Some questions linger-on particularly when looking at food sovereignty as a HR issue; here they are:
- What characterizes the context in which food sovereignty emerged as a concrete demand of social movements?
- How, if at all, does foreign trade fit into the food sovereignty paradigm? (Is it possible to incorporate the millions of small farmers that produce commodities for export into a food sovereignty model and, if so, under what terms?).
- As a mobilizing concept, what role can food sovereignty play in helping food-deficit nations move towards greater food self-sufficiency? (And is this always possible or desirable?).
- What do the growing material and strategic importance of urban agriculture mean for the construction of food sovereignty?
- How can food sovereignty help bridge the land, resource, market and policy struggles of rural and urban producers?
- What will be required to implement and administer food sovereignty and who will do it? (i.e., Who is the sovereign in food sovereignty?).
- What kinds of limitations or regulations on particular kinds of production or trade, if any, does food sovereignty imply?
- How much pluralism is acceptable in a food-sovereign society with respect to models of agricultural production, commerce and consumption?
- What are the obstacles to scaling up agroecology as a strategy of resistance to industrial agriculture and to centering agroecology as a normative farming method in the future?
- How will the centering of agroecology vis-a-vis industrial agriculture affect farming methods? (How compatible is a mix?).
- What methods of production are currently being set up centered on agroecology and food sovereignty?
- What kinds of land property relations may characterize a food-sovereign society?
- What combinations of cooperative or collective practices and individual ones are likely to be most effective?
- How does food sovereignty address the complex agrarian transitions to modern food systems? (e.g., agricultural inputs, informatics…)
- How will food sovereignty serve to stabilize livelihoods and labor flows to build greater social resilience?
- What are the roles and realities of food workers, consumers and people in general in moving towards food sovereignty?
- If food sovereignty is founded on the right to food, how does it relate to the many other rights-oriented food movements that currently do not necessarily embrace the food sovereignty framework?
- What difference does food sovereignty make within broader political-economic transformations? and
- What impacts and implications does food sovereignty have for the transition to a post-petroleum, post-growth and/or post-capitalist society?
6. This Reader certainly does not have the answers to these important questions, but I am sure the experts are addressing them. Stay tuned…
How some out-of-the-box ideas fall into deaf ears or disappear from our radar
7. I had never heard of UN member states being asked to sign a “morally binding public register of commitments” to address hunger and malnutrition in their countries. It strikes me as being much more than a curiosity. [In their Chapter of the 2011 book “New Challenges to the Right to Food” (CEHAP, Cordoba and Huygens Editorial, Barcelona), Andrew MacMillan and Jose Luis Vivero proposed a template for such a register in the Annex 2 to the chapter and is reproduced here].
ANNEX 2: National Declaration of Commitment to Eradicate Hunger and Malnutrition by 2025
8. Eradicating hunger and malnutrition is entirely possible. The solutions will be country-specific and will involve a combination of short and long-term policies and programs for sustainable smallholder agriculture, food stocks management, social protection, trade, employment, population, disaster risk reduction, emergency response and wide-ranging nutrition and primary health-care interventions. Macro-economic and fiscal management policy adjustments will also be required. Under human rights law, including the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), governments have legal obligations to respect, fulfil and protect the right to adequate food (Art 11, ICESCR) which is inextricably linked and is indispensable to the realization of other fundamental rights and freedoms including the right to life.
9. “So, we ask, how can member states be made accountable to comply? We came up with the idea of gathering binding commitments –in the form of morally-binding declarations– in a UN register. Here is how we worded it”:
Declaration
By signing and depositing this voluntary Declaration of Commitment in the International Public Register of Commitment (IPRC), the Government of ……………………………. pledges to take all necessary actions to end hunger and malnutrition by 2025, within our country and worldwide. Specifically, we shall:
I. Offer leadership by example in the fight against hunger and malnutrition nationally, regionally and internationally, including by fostering greater coordination and cooperation between committed nations.
II. Meet our legal obligations to protect, respect and fulfil the right of everyone to adequate food –which includes freedom from hunger and malnutrition.
III. Engage in compacts with other nations to share knowledge and experience ensure greater predictable financial and technical cooperation, as requested by them and proportionate to their own contributions, in order to help achieve the goals set by them for their own territory.
IV. Avoid unilateral actions and policies that could significantly damage the achievement of the agreed goal by other countries.
V. Consult with all other committed countries in addressing global issues that affect food availability and accessibility, quality, trade, distribution and access, with the aim of reaching international agreements that are supportive to the goal of ending hunger and malnutrition.
VI. Contribute to safeguarding the adequacy and sustainability of global food supplies to meet the needs of future generations.
VII. Submit to the IPRC, within 24 months of the date of registration, a detailed and specific Action Plan, prepared with the full involvement of all stakeholders, covering the actions that we shall undertake nationally and internationally to fulfil each of the above commitments, including time-bound intermediate goals and indicators to be used in assessing progress.
VIII. Propose, within 24 months of the date of registration, the passage of national legislation that embodies the above commitments.
IX. Submit periodic reports on progress in implementing the Action Plan to the IPRC, as requested by them, and facilitate the preparation of shadow reports by UN agencies and by relevant international and national Civil Society Organizations.
Signed on behalf of the Government of ……………………By……………………………………(name and title) (signature) Date: ……………..Received and Registered, on behalf of…………………(UN body)
By…………………(name and title) (signature) Date:………
10. To wish, perchance to dream…
Claudio Schuftan, Ho Chi Minh City
Your comments are welcome at schuftan@gmail.com