The background was a decision made by the Governing Body of the Plant Treaty at its ninth session (Resolution 7/2022), requesting the Secretary, subject to the availability of financial resources, to organize a Global Symposium to share experiences and discuss possible future work on Farmers’ Rights, and welcoming the offer of the Government of India to host it. The Governments of Italy and Norway provided financial resources that made the organisation of the Global Symposium possible.

The Global Symposium on Farmers’ Rights was held from 12 to 15 September 2023 at the ICAR Convention Center, New Delhi. It was aimed to provide a forum to share experiences, innovative approaches, effective policies and best practices, and to promote learning among participants on implementing Farmers’ Rights, as set out in Article 9 of the Plant Treaty. The President of India inaugurated the symposium, stressing the need to make a common commitment for the fulfilment of Farmers’ Rights. The ceremony included a presentation of Indian Genome Saviour and Community Awards to a long range of awardees: farmers and farming communities significantly contributing to the conservation of crop genetic diversity. It also featured welcome and opening addresses from several Indian dignitaries.

Following an opening session, the technical sessions were structured around five themes related to Farmers' Rights,

  1. Options for realizing Farmers’ Rights as set out in Article 9 of the International Treaty Session.
  2. Legal and other measures supporting the realization of Farmers’ Rights Session.
  3. International processes and other issues of relevance to Farmers’ Rights Session.
  4. State of implementation of Article 9 of the International Treaty Session and ways forward.
  5. Proposal for future work on Farmers’ Rights.

Open discussions were held at the end of each session. In addition to these and panel discussions, the Government of India organized three special events to promote focused discussions on specific topics and gather ideas that could facilitate the implementation of practical approaches to realizing Farmers' Rights, as well as exploring possible elements for future work on Farmers’ Rights. The special events were 1. Farmers’ forum; 2. South-south cooperation on Farmers’ Rights, and 3. Community gene banks and value chains.

The participants were policymakers, farmers and farmers’ organizations, non-government organizations, civil society organizations, researchers, and inter-governmental organizations, as well as dignitaries, senior government officials and a large number of farmers from India. Around 200 participants actively participated in the technical sessions and events. 

A report from the Global Symposium on Farmers Rights including detailed recommendations on ways forward (Session 4) is available here.

Main recommendations as summarised by the Secretariat of the Plant Treaty (PDF, 508KB) were:

International Level:

  • promote continuous sharing of experiences, best practices, and lessons learned from the realization of Farmers’ Rights;
  • empower farmers, especially women and youth, and promote their participation in international processes and discussions related to PGRFA;
  • carry out inter-sessional work to develop voluntary guidelines for the implementation of Farmers’ Rights and promote the use of the Inventory and the Options;
  • promote regional and south-south cooperation;
  • strengthen farmers’ capacity, e.g., through capacity building and awareness-raising activities on Farmers’ Rights and providing required technical and institutional support to farmers at national and regional levels;
  • develop mechanisms to support farmers to produce their own seeds, and to save, sell, share, and exchange seeds;
  • promote links between the International Treaty and human rights and other relevant bodies, and international cooperation to strengthen the implementation of Farmers’ Rights;
  • conduct work on how farmer-managed seed systems and the formal seed system can complement each other and serve the needs of farmers;
  • conduct studies to understand the impact of DSI/GSD on farmers and to revisit the notion of stewardship and open access; in this context, to consider the ongoing processes and discussions to enhance the functioning of the Multilateral System and at the Open-Ended Working Group of the Convention on Biological Diversity, and to assess the possible impact of their work on Farmers’ Rights; and
  • strengthen the benefit-sharing mechanism to support farmers more directly.

 

National level:

  • promote national implementation of Farmers’ Rights;
  • enhance the realisation of Farmers’ Rights by drawing from the experiences contained in the Options;
  • continue sharing experiences by submitting more measures to the Inventory and be inspired by other experiences as captured in the Inventory;
  • develop measures to institutionalise farmer-managed seed systems, or guarantee the support and recognition of farmer/peasant seed systems;
  • boost outreach activities and capacity building; and
  • take measures to safeguard Farmers’ Rights.

 

The results from the symposium were presented in a report to the Governing Body og the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture at its 10th Session in 2023.