Farmers' Rights was among the most contested issues during the negotiations towards the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.

The Leipzig Conference on Plant Genetic Resources was a major event in the 1990s. Here too the importance of the realization of Farmers' Rights was addressed. It was highlighted in the Global Plan of Action for the Conservation and Sustainable use of Plant Genetic Resources, as well as in the comprehensive State of the World's Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, which formed a basis for the conference.

The issue of Farmers' Rights was addressed during the negotiations leading to the Convention on Biological Diversity as well as in the Agenda 21, both adopted in 1992. These were important points of reference for later negotiations towards the International Treaty.

1989 marks a breakthrough for the negotiations on Farmers' Rights in the FAO. The FAO Conference adopted two resolutions on Farmers' Rights, one of which should provide an important basis for all further negotiations.

The Keystone Dialoges from 1988 until 1991 were instrumental in framing the issue of Farmers' Rights and providing a basis for the recognition of these rights by the FAO Conference.

Thorough analysis of the documentation shows that the concept of Farmers' Rights was first brought up in international negotiations in the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in 1986.

This article summarizes some of the most important aspects of the history of Farmers' Rights. You can read more about them in the other articles under History of Farmers' Rights.

The first use of Farmers' Rights as a political concept dates back to the early 1980s, when Pat Roy Mooney and Cary Fowler of the then Rural Advancement Foundation International (now ETC-Group) coined the term to highlight the valuable but unrewarded contributions of farmers to plant genetic resources for food and agriculture.

To understand the provisions on Farmers' Rights in the International Treaty, it is useful to review the history of negotiations regarding these rights. Since Farmers' Rights were first taken up in international negotiations in 1986, important clarifications have been made.