What are food sovereignty and smallholder market initiatives?
Since the beginning of this year, the issue of US beef imports has once again stirred public concern and discussion about food safety. What set off this wave of public concern over US beef imports was the petition campaign for a referendum to "restart Taiwan-US negotiations," jointly launched at the end of 2009 by civic groups including the Homemakers United Foundation, the Homemakers United Consumer Cooperative, and the Consumers' Foundation, Chinese Taipei, in protest against the Amendment to the Regulations Governing the Import of US Beef and Its Products issued by the Department of Health of the Executive Yuan on November 2, 2009.
Because the referendum proposal was deliberated for too long in the Legislative Yuan, public enthusiasm cooled for a time, until ractopamine was detected in US beef in early 2011, once again drawing public concern. Yet a careful examination of the US beef import issue reveals that it is not purely a matter of food safety; it is also entangled with the demands or pressures of international political economy (such as Taiwan-US relations and participation in international multilateral trade organizations), leaving the public hesitant, under the intimidation that "if we don't import US beef, Taiwan has no future," about whether to open the door to US beef imports that carry safety concerns.
In this wave of food safety debate, supporters of opening the market have consistently refused to discuss: do we have the "right" to decide the quality of food we want? Should we surrender our "food sovereignty" in exchange for uncertain multilateral trade cooperation? Do we have the "right" to reject multilateral cooperation's control over food?
From May 20 to 25, 2012, I went to Montpellier, a historic city in southern France, to attend the 13th International Congress of Ethnobiology. The theme of this session was "Cultural Diversity, Ecological Diversity, and Sustainable Management: Discovering the Past and Building the Future." Among the topics, "food sovereignty" is a concept that has gained attention in international academic and agricultural movement circles in recent years, and many studies on food sovereignty were presented at this symposium. This article therefore introduces the concept of food sovereignty, and further explains the significance of this advocacy for local food production, as well as what contributions small farmers' markets can make to food sovereignty.
What Is Food Sovereignty
What is "food sovereignty"? The term food sovereignty is a political proposition put forward in 1996 by "Via Campesina," which advocates that individuals, communities, peoples, and nations have the right to define their own agricultural, livestock, and fisheries policies and other agricultural and food policies, free from the oppression of dumping by other countries. The advocacy of food sovereignty differs from the proposition of "food security" in that it places greater emphasis on the importance of "culture" in food choices. Food sovereignty stresses that people not only have the "human right" to be free from famine or unsafe food, but also the "cultural right" to choose food suited to their culture. The concept is based on the following seven principles:
1. Food is a basic right of the people: Everyone must be guaranteed safe, nutritious food suited to their culture, in order to maintain a healthy life and dignity for humankind.
2. Land to the tiller: A genuine land reform is necessary, so that landless farmers obtain land and the power to control their farmland, and indigenous peoples' traditional territories are returned; this right must not be discriminated against on the basis of gender, religion, ethnicity, social class, or ideology.
3. Protect natural resources: Promote the sustainable use and care of natural resources, especially land, water, seeds, and livestock. Those who cultivate the land have the right to practice sustainable management of natural resources and to protect ecological diversity.
4. Oppose the World Bank, WTO, and IMF helping multinational corporations control agriculture: Food is the primary and most basic source of nutrition, yet it is only a secondary item in trade. A country's agricultural policy must give priority to supplying domestic consumption and to food self-sufficiency. Food imports must not replace local production, nor drive down prices.
5. End the globalization of famine: Food sovereignty is undermined by multilateral institutions and speculative capital, and the economic policies of multilateral organizations have encouraged control over agricultural policy. Therefore, ending multilateral cooperation's control over food is equivalent to ending the globalization of famine.
6. Social peace: Everyone has the freedom to be free from violence; food must not be used as a weapon to increase poverty, push disadvantaged groups to the margins, subject indigenous peoples to unfair conditions, force urbanization, or oppress small farmers.
7. Democratic decision-making: The United Nations or related organizations must open a democratic process that allows farmers to participate directly in the formulation of agricultural policy, and everyone has the right to obtain honest and accurate information. This is the foundation of good governance, equal participation, and the avoidance of all kinds of discrimination.
(The author is an assistant professor in the Department of Environmental and Cultural Resources at National Hsinchu University of Education)