During this biennium, an Inventory of National Measures, Practices and Lessons Learned from the Implementation of Farmers’ Rights was developed by the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on Farmers’ Rights that had been established at the Seven Session of the Governing Body in 2017.

The Plant Treaty provides the international platform for negotiations on the realization of Farmers’ Rights related to crop genetic resources. Here you can read about the negotiations on Farmers’ Rights at each of the sessions of the Governing Body of the Plant Treaty.

This is the sixth category of options to encourage, guide and promote the realization of Farmers’ Rights in the Options Document. It comprises options for the facilitation of farmers’ access to a diversity of PGRFA through community seed banks, seed networks and other measures improving farmers’ choices of a wider diversity of PGRFA.

The most important event during this biennium was the Bali Global Consultation on Farmers’ Rights. Gathering 95 participants from all regions and major stakeholder groups taking stock and discussing future action, it represented a milestone in the international work for Farmers’ Rights.

This biennium was characterized by a compilation of submissions that the Plant Treaty Secretariat had been requested to do, by dialogues within the FAO and an initiative on the interrelations between with the Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) relating to Farmers’ Rights.

In this biennium, there were lots of activities, even though no global or regional events took place. Many of the activities were reflected in a compilation from the Plant Treaty Secretariat. Among the contributions was a new book on success stories from the realization of Farmers’ Rights.

In this section, you will find links to selected websites and other resources of relevance to Farmers' Rights.

In this biennium a multitude of initiatives were taken in different parts of the world to compile and analyze views and experiences related to the realization of Farmers’ Rights, most importantly an international on-line consultation and a series of reports on the state of Farmers’ Rights.

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP) has a comprehensive scope and comprises many more rights than those related to seed and genetic resources. Also, the rights related to seed and genetic resourse are much more far reaching than those provided on Farmers’ Rights in the Plant Treaty. As a declaration, however, this is not a legally binding instrument, and even if the majority of countries supported the declaration, many countries have not. Nevertheless, UNDROP establishes important international norms shared by the majority of states, which may also affect the implementation of Farmers’ Rights under the Plant Treaty.

In this biennium, the most important activities were the Global Consultations on Farmers’ Rights. A first part was e-mail-based and reached out to all regions and stakeholder groups. The second part was a conference in Addis Ababa, with regional elements. A total of 160 stakeholders were consulted.