FAO Symposium on Biotechnology: How the UN FAO is being strong-armed by the private seed industry

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Symposium on Agricultural Biotechnologies was held at the FAO headquarters in Rome between 15^th and 17^th Feb 2016. This particular symposium was conducted in the aftermath of the celebrated success of the Agroecology symposium organized by FAO in 2014. That the agribusiness industry was disconcerted by the euphoria surrounding agroecology and hence strong-arming the FAO to organize a similar event on agricultural biotechnology is no secret. Hence there was a strong undercurrent that the FAO was losing its proclaimed ‘neutral’ position in agriculture.

The conference took off on a note of FAO considering ‘every possible alternative’ to end world hunger and malnutrition, given population growth and climate change. The Director General José Graziano da Silvarepeatedly stressed that agricultural biotechnology was not limited to Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) alone. Though this is true, GMOs dominate the global agri-biotech industry, and are extremely controversial, to say the least. Almost every speaker who spoke afterward stressed the same point so much so that even an unbiased delegate became suspicious of the speaker’s ulterior intentions.

The plenary session consisted of the following Keynote addresses:

1. The state of knowledge in biotechnology, by Louise Fresco, President, Executive Board of Wageningen UR, Wageningen, The Netherlands

2. Towards ending the misplaced global debate on biotechnology, by GebisaEjeta, Distinguished Professor, Purdue University, West Lafayette, United States of America

3. Biotechnologies in action in Brazil, by Maurício Lopes, President, EmpresaBrasileira de PesquisaAgropecuária, Brasília, Brazil

4. Breakthroughs in resource productivity, by Gunter Pauli, Founder, Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives Network, Japan

Out of the 4 speakers, 3 were pro biotech (read GMO) and only the last one, Gunter Pauli, spoke about creating systems and processes that used natural synergies and much more productive than agri-biotech. The same pattern was repeated over the entire conference, with civil society getting only one speaker slot out of more than 80 invited speakers. Of course this was expected as FAO intended it to portray the latest advances in agri-biotech. But what was not expected was the blatant advertising that the industry indulged in. From CropLife International to DuPont Pioneer, Borlaug Institute to IFPRI, they were all there to proclaim that the notorious agri-biotech industry is the only solution to end world hunger and help agriculture adapt to climate change. (Climate change is now the latest excuse these entities are giving to continue selling their extremely climate non-resilient technologies.)

As the conference concluded, there was a call to bridge agricultural biotechnology with agroecology. Anybody who knows anything about agriculture knows this is not possible. Agricultural biotech promotes monoculture, industrial farming, sky-rocketing input costs, concentration of seeds in the hands of a few elite companies, widening of the IPR net and resulting in the farmer becoming a mere pawn in this racket. Agroecology on the other hand is based on mixed cropping, low input costs, family owned farms and seeds, and is dedicated to conserving the fertility of the soil, the natural environment and the sovereign rights of the farmer.  How can the twain meet? And why is FAO being forced to build this impossible and dangerous bridge?

If a bridge must be built, it is the one between farmers of different countries, suffering corporate and many times their Governments’ biased policies. Small farmers practicing Agro-ecology is the best bet we have to feed and cool the planet.