Seed Diversity, Farmers’ Rights, and the Politics of Re-peasantization
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Published
Jun 4, 2012
Elisa Da Vià
Abstract
Over the last decade, the practice of using and exchanging locally adapted seeds has become a focal site of grass-roots organizing in the rural areas of Europe, spear-headed by the mobilization of seed networks in different countries and regions. Countering the restrictive scope of existing seed regulations, these networks are composed of family farmers, collectives, farmers movements, researchers, agronomists, and non-governmental organizations that are actively engaged in the development of farmer-based seed systems as a source of both peasant autonomy and environmental sustainability. Within the context of a broader struggle to overcome the multiple crises of the agro-industrial model, the reproduction of farm-saved seeds is closely associated with the promotion of agro-ecological alternatives that enhance integration, resilience, and livelihood security. Correspondingly, the goal to diversify food and seed systems puts renewed emphasis on the role of peasant innovation and localized consumption in processes of agrarian transformation. Combining sustainable farming methods, participatory forms of knowledge and de-commodified circuits of exchange, these initiatives reassert the centrality of the social and ecological role of agriculture in Europe beyond the reductionism of market-based approaches to rural change.
How to Cite
Da Vià, E. . (2012) “Seed Diversity, Farmers’ Rights, and the Politics of Re-peasantization ”, The International Journal of Sociology of Agriculture and Food. Paris, France, 19(2), pp. 229–242. doi: 10.48416/ijsaf.v19i2.227.
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References
Altieri, M.A. and Toledo, V.M. (2011) The agroecological revolution in Latin America: rescuing nature,
ensuring food sovereignty and empowering peasants, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(3), pp. 587–612.
Altieri, M.A. (1995) Agroecology: The Science of Sustainable Agriculture. Boulder: Westview Press.
Amin, S. and Vergoupoulos, K. (1974) La question paysanne et le capitalisme. Paris: Éditions Anthropos-Idep.
Andersen, R. and Winge, T. (2008) Success Stories from the Realization of Farmers’ Rights Related to Plant Genetic
Resources for Food and Agriculture, FNI Report 4/2008. Lysaker: Fridtjof Nansen Institute.
Angelini, M. (2008) Le patate della tradizione rurale sull’Appennino ligure. Chiavari: Grafica Piemme.
Banaji, J. (1977) Modes of production in a materialist conception of history, Capital and Class, 3, pp. 1–44.
Bertacchini, E. (2009) Regional legislation in Italy for the protection of local varieties, Journal of Agriculture
and Environment for International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 51–63.
Bernstein, H. (1994) Agrarian classes in capitalist development, in: L. Sklair (ed.) Capitalism and Development.
London: Routledge.
Bocci, R. (2009) Seed legislation and agrobiodiversity: conservation varieties, Journal of Agriculture and
Environment for International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 31–49.
Bocci, R. and Chable, V. (2009) Peasant seeds in Europe: stakes and prospects, Journal of Agriculture and
Environment for International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 81–93.
Bocci, R., Chable, V., Kästler, G. and Louwaa rs, N. (2010) Policy Recommendations: Set of Recommendations
on Farm Conservation Strategy, the Role of Innovative Market Mechanisms, Legislative Framework for Landraces,
Conservation Varieties and Amateur Varieties in Europe, Farm Seed Opportunities D4.6. Paris: INRA.
Borras, S.M. (2009) Agrarian change and peasant studies: changes, continuities and challenges – an introduction,
Journal of Peasant Studies, 36(1), pp. 5–31.
Castree, N. (2001) Marxism, capitalism, and the production of nature, in: N. Castree and B. Braun (eds)
Social Nature: Theory, Practice, and Politics. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, pp. 189–207.
Ceccarelli, S. (2009) Evolution, plant breeding and biodiversity, Journal of Agriculture and Environment for
International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 131–145.
Chable, V. and Berthellot, J.F. (2006) La sélection participative en France: presentation des experiences en
cours pour les agricultures biologiques et paysannes, Dossier de l’environment de l’INRA, 30, pp. 129–138.
Chable, V. Goldringer, I., Daws on, J., Bocci, R., Lammerts va n Bueren, E., Serpolay, E., González, J.M.,
Valero, T., Levillain, T., Van der Burg, J. W., Pimbert, M., Pino, S. and Kik, C. (2009) Farm Seed Opportunities:
a project to promote landrace use and renew biodiversity, in: M. Veteläinen, V. Negri and
N. Maxted (eds) European Landraces: On Farm Conservation, Management, and Use, Bioversity Technical
Bulletin No. 15. Rome: Bioversity International, pp. 266–274.
Corrado, A. (2008) Semi, contadini e mercati: le reti per un’altra agricoltura, Sociologia urbana e rurale,
30(87), pp. 135–152.
de Janvri, A. and Garramon, C. (1977) The dynamics of rural poverty in Latin America, Journal of Peasant
Studies, 4, pp. 206–218.
De Schutter, O. (2009) Seed Policies and the Right to Food: Enhancing Agrobiodiversity, Encouraging Innovation.
Presented at the 64th session of the UN General Assembly, New York, October 2009.
FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2004) Building on Gender, Agrobiodiversity
and Local Knowledge. Rome: FAO.
FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2009) International Treaty on Plant Genetic
Resources for Food and Agriculture. Published online
FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2011) Save and Grow: A Policymaker’s
Guide to The Sustainable Intensification of Smallholder Crop Production. Rome: FAO.
Fonte, M. (2010) Introduction: food relocalisation and knowledge dynamics for sustainability in rural
areas, in: M. Fonte and A. Papadopoulos (eds) Naming Food After Places: Food Relocalisation and Knowledge
Dynamics in Rural Development. Farnham: Ashgate, pp.1–35.
Friedmann, H. (1978) World market, state and family farm: social bases of household production in the era
of wage labor, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 20(4), pp. 545–586.
Friedmann, H. (1980) Household production and the national economy: concepts for the analysis of agrarian
formations, Journal of Peasant Studies, 7(2), pp. 158–184.
Gliessman, S.R. (1998) Agreoecology: Ecological Processes in Sustainable Agriculture. Ann Arbor, MI: Ann Arbor
Press.
Goodman, D. and Redclift, M. (1982) From Peasant to Proletarian: Capitalist Developments and Agrarian Transitions.
New York: St Martin’s Press.
GRAIN (2008) Whose Harvest? The Politics of Organic Seed Certification, GRAIN Briefings 3 January 2008.
Barcelona: GRAIN.
Guthman, J. (2004) The trouble with ‘organic lite’ in California: a rejoinder to the ‘conventionalisation’
debate, Sociologia Ruralis, 44(3), pp. 301–316.
IFOAM (International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements) (2011) IFOAM Position on the Use
of Organic Seed and Plant Propagation Material in Organic Agriculture. Published online
IFPRI (International Food Policy Research Institute) (2011) G20 Ministers of Agriculture Must Focus on
Smallholder Farmers to Achieve Food Security and Prevent Food Price Volatility, Press Statement, 15 June.
Published online, accessed 20 September
2011.
Kästler, G. (2005) Europe’s seed laws: locking out farmers, Seedling, July, pp. 10–16.
Kloppenburg, J., Jr. (1988) First the Seed: The Political Economy of Plant Biotechnology: 1492–2000. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Kloppenburg, J., Jr. (2010) Impeding dispossession, enabling repossession: biological open source and the
recovery of seed sovereignty, Journal of Agrarian Change, 10(3), pp. 367–388.
Lewontin, R. (1982) Agricultural research and the penetration of capital, Science for the People, 14(1), pp.
12–17.
Lockie, S., Lyons, K., Law rence, G. and Halpin, D. (2006) Going Organic: Mobilizing Networks for Environmentally
Responsible Food Production. Wallingford: CABI.
Lockie, S. and Carpenter, D. (2010) Agriculture, Biodiversity and Markets: Livelihood and Agroecology in Comparative
Perspective. London: Earthscan.
Louwaa rs, N. (2005) Biases and bottlenecks: time to reform the South’s inherited seed laws?, Seedling, July,
pp. 4–9.
Louwaa rs, N.P. (2007) Seeds of Confusion: The Impact of Policies on Seed Systems. PhD Dissertation, Wageningen
University.
Luetchford, P. and Pratt, J. (2011) Values and markets: an analysis of organic farming initiatives in Andalusia,
Journal of Agrarian Change, 11(1), pp. 87–103.
McIntyre, B.D., Herren, H.R., Wakhungu, J. and Watson, R.T. (eds) (2008) International Assessment of Agricultural
Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD): Global Report. Washington, DC:
Island Press.
McMichael, P. (2008) Peasants make their own history, but not just as they please…, Journal of Agrarian
Change, 8(2–3), pp. 205–228.
McMichael, P. (2010) Food sovereignty in movement: addressing the triple crisis, in: H. Wittman, A.A.
Desmarais and N. Wiebe (eds) Food Sovereignty: Reconnecting Food, Nature and Community. Oakland, CA:
Food First Books, pp. 168–185.
McMichael, P. (2012) Food regime crisis and revaluing the agrarian question, in: R. Almas and H. Campbell
(eds) Rethinking Agricultural Policy Regimes: Food Security, Climate Change and the Future Resilience of
Global Agriculture. Bingley: Emerald Group Publishing, pp. 99–122.
Perfecto, I. and Vandermeer, J. (2010) The agroecological matrix as alternative to the land-sparing/agriculture
intensification model, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(13), pp. 5786–5791.
Ploeg, J.D. va n der (2008) The New Peasantries: Struggles for Autonomy and Sustainability in an Era of Empire
and Globalization. London: Earthscan.
Ploeg, J.D. va n der (2010) The peasantry of the twentieth century: the commoditisation debate revisited,
Journal of Peasant Studies, 37(1), pp. 1–30.
Red de Semillas (2008) Resembrando e intercambiando. Published online
Rosset, P.M. and Altieri, M. (1997) Agroecology versus input substitution: a fundamental contradiction of
sustainable agriculture, Society and Natural Resources, 10(3), pp. 283–295.
Rosset, P., Sosa, B.M., Jaime, A.M.R. and Avila Lozano, D.R. (2011) The campesino-to-campesino agroecology
movement of ANAP in Cuba: social process methodology in the construction of sustainable peasant
agriculture and food sovereignty, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(1), pp. 161–191.
Schneider, M. and McMichael, P. (2010) Deepening, and repairing, the metabolic rift, Journal of Peasant
Studies, 37(3), pp. 461–484.
Scialabba, N., Grandi, C. and Henatsch, C. (2002) Organic Agriculture and Genetic Resources for Food and
Agriculture. Rome: FAO. Published online,
accessed 12 October 2011.
Soriano Niebla, J.J., Figueroa Zapata, M.G., Guzmán Casado, I. and Avila Cano, E. (1996) Desarrollo de
un centro de experimentación y producción de germoplasma para la agricultura ecológica en Andalucía, in: Sociedad Española de Agricultura Ecológica, Acta del II Congreso de la SEAE ‘Agricultura
ecológica y desarrollo rural’, Pamplona, September. Published online
.pdf>, accessed 26 September 2011.
Soriano Niebla, J.J., Guzmán Casado, G.I., García Jiménez, S.F., Figueroa Zapata, M. and Lora González, A.
(1998) Recuperación de variedades locales de hortalizas para su cultivo ecológico, in: Sociedad Española
de Agricultura Ecológica, Actas del III Congreso de la SEAE ‘Una alternativa para el mundo rural del tercer
milenio‘, Valencia, September. Published online
Swyngedouw, E. (2000) The Marxian alternative: historical-geographical materialism and the political
economy of capitalism, in: E. Sheppard and T.J. Barnes (eds) A Companion to Economic Geography. Oxford:
Blackwell Publishers, pp. 41–59.
Tovey, H. (2002) Alternative agriculture movements and rural development cosmologies, International
Journal of Sociology of Agriculture and Food, 10(1), pp. 1–11.
Vellvé, R. (1992) Saving the Seed: Genetic Diversity and European Agriculture. London: Earthscan.
Veteläinen, M., Negri, V. and Maxted, N. (2009) European Landraces: On Farm Conservation, Management,
and Use, Bioversity Technical Bulletin No. 15. Rome: Bioversity International.
Visser, B. (2002) An agrobiodiversity perspective on seed policies, in: N.P. Louwaa rs (ed.) Seed Policy, Legislation
and Law: Widening a Narrow Focus. Binghamtom NY: Food Products Press, pp. 231–245.
ensuring food sovereignty and empowering peasants, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(3), pp. 587–612.
Altieri, M.A. (1995) Agroecology: The Science of Sustainable Agriculture. Boulder: Westview Press.
Amin, S. and Vergoupoulos, K. (1974) La question paysanne et le capitalisme. Paris: Éditions Anthropos-Idep.
Andersen, R. and Winge, T. (2008) Success Stories from the Realization of Farmers’ Rights Related to Plant Genetic
Resources for Food and Agriculture, FNI Report 4/2008. Lysaker: Fridtjof Nansen Institute.
Angelini, M. (2008) Le patate della tradizione rurale sull’Appennino ligure. Chiavari: Grafica Piemme.
Banaji, J. (1977) Modes of production in a materialist conception of history, Capital and Class, 3, pp. 1–44.
Bertacchini, E. (2009) Regional legislation in Italy for the protection of local varieties, Journal of Agriculture
and Environment for International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 51–63.
Bernstein, H. (1994) Agrarian classes in capitalist development, in: L. Sklair (ed.) Capitalism and Development.
London: Routledge.
Bocci, R. (2009) Seed legislation and agrobiodiversity: conservation varieties, Journal of Agriculture and
Environment for International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 31–49.
Bocci, R. and Chable, V. (2009) Peasant seeds in Europe: stakes and prospects, Journal of Agriculture and
Environment for International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 81–93.
Bocci, R., Chable, V., Kästler, G. and Louwaa rs, N. (2010) Policy Recommendations: Set of Recommendations
on Farm Conservation Strategy, the Role of Innovative Market Mechanisms, Legislative Framework for Landraces,
Conservation Varieties and Amateur Varieties in Europe, Farm Seed Opportunities D4.6. Paris: INRA.
Borras, S.M. (2009) Agrarian change and peasant studies: changes, continuities and challenges – an introduction,
Journal of Peasant Studies, 36(1), pp. 5–31.
Castree, N. (2001) Marxism, capitalism, and the production of nature, in: N. Castree and B. Braun (eds)
Social Nature: Theory, Practice, and Politics. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, pp. 189–207.
Ceccarelli, S. (2009) Evolution, plant breeding and biodiversity, Journal of Agriculture and Environment for
International Development, 103(1/2), pp. 131–145.
Chable, V. and Berthellot, J.F. (2006) La sélection participative en France: presentation des experiences en
cours pour les agricultures biologiques et paysannes, Dossier de l’environment de l’INRA, 30, pp. 129–138.
Chable, V. Goldringer, I., Daws on, J., Bocci, R., Lammerts va n Bueren, E., Serpolay, E., González, J.M.,
Valero, T., Levillain, T., Van der Burg, J. W., Pimbert, M., Pino, S. and Kik, C. (2009) Farm Seed Opportunities:
a project to promote landrace use and renew biodiversity, in: M. Veteläinen, V. Negri and
N. Maxted (eds) European Landraces: On Farm Conservation, Management, and Use, Bioversity Technical
Bulletin No. 15. Rome: Bioversity International, pp. 266–274.
Corrado, A. (2008) Semi, contadini e mercati: le reti per un’altra agricoltura, Sociologia urbana e rurale,
30(87), pp. 135–152.
de Janvri, A. and Garramon, C. (1977) The dynamics of rural poverty in Latin America, Journal of Peasant
Studies, 4, pp. 206–218.
De Schutter, O. (2009) Seed Policies and the Right to Food: Enhancing Agrobiodiversity, Encouraging Innovation.
Presented at the 64th session of the UN General Assembly, New York, October 2009.
FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2004) Building on Gender, Agrobiodiversity
and Local Knowledge. Rome: FAO.
FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2009) International Treaty on Plant Genetic
Resources for Food and Agriculture. Published online
FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2011) Save and Grow: A Policymaker’s
Guide to The Sustainable Intensification of Smallholder Crop Production. Rome: FAO.
Fonte, M. (2010) Introduction: food relocalisation and knowledge dynamics for sustainability in rural
areas, in: M. Fonte and A. Papadopoulos (eds) Naming Food After Places: Food Relocalisation and Knowledge
Dynamics in Rural Development. Farnham: Ashgate, pp.1–35.
Friedmann, H. (1978) World market, state and family farm: social bases of household production in the era
of wage labor, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 20(4), pp. 545–586.
Friedmann, H. (1980) Household production and the national economy: concepts for the analysis of agrarian
formations, Journal of Peasant Studies, 7(2), pp. 158–184.
Gliessman, S.R. (1998) Agreoecology: Ecological Processes in Sustainable Agriculture. Ann Arbor, MI: Ann Arbor
Press.
Goodman, D. and Redclift, M. (1982) From Peasant to Proletarian: Capitalist Developments and Agrarian Transitions.
New York: St Martin’s Press.
GRAIN (2008) Whose Harvest? The Politics of Organic Seed Certification, GRAIN Briefings 3 January 2008.
Barcelona: GRAIN.
Guthman, J. (2004) The trouble with ‘organic lite’ in California: a rejoinder to the ‘conventionalisation’
debate, Sociologia Ruralis, 44(3), pp. 301–316.
IFOAM (International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements) (2011) IFOAM Position on the Use
of Organic Seed and Plant Propagation Material in Organic Agriculture. Published online
IFPRI (International Food Policy Research Institute) (2011) G20 Ministers of Agriculture Must Focus on
Smallholder Farmers to Achieve Food Security and Prevent Food Price Volatility, Press Statement, 15 June.
Published online
2011.
Kästler, G. (2005) Europe’s seed laws: locking out farmers, Seedling, July, pp. 10–16.
Kloppenburg, J., Jr. (1988) First the Seed: The Political Economy of Plant Biotechnology: 1492–2000. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Kloppenburg, J., Jr. (2010) Impeding dispossession, enabling repossession: biological open source and the
recovery of seed sovereignty, Journal of Agrarian Change, 10(3), pp. 367–388.
Lewontin, R. (1982) Agricultural research and the penetration of capital, Science for the People, 14(1), pp.
12–17.
Lockie, S., Lyons, K., Law rence, G. and Halpin, D. (2006) Going Organic: Mobilizing Networks for Environmentally
Responsible Food Production. Wallingford: CABI.
Lockie, S. and Carpenter, D. (2010) Agriculture, Biodiversity and Markets: Livelihood and Agroecology in Comparative
Perspective. London: Earthscan.
Louwaa rs, N. (2005) Biases and bottlenecks: time to reform the South’s inherited seed laws?, Seedling, July,
pp. 4–9.
Louwaa rs, N.P. (2007) Seeds of Confusion: The Impact of Policies on Seed Systems. PhD Dissertation, Wageningen
University.
Luetchford, P. and Pratt, J. (2011) Values and markets: an analysis of organic farming initiatives in Andalusia,
Journal of Agrarian Change, 11(1), pp. 87–103.
McIntyre, B.D., Herren, H.R., Wakhungu, J. and Watson, R.T. (eds) (2008) International Assessment of Agricultural
Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD): Global Report. Washington, DC:
Island Press.
McMichael, P. (2008) Peasants make their own history, but not just as they please…, Journal of Agrarian
Change, 8(2–3), pp. 205–228.
McMichael, P. (2010) Food sovereignty in movement: addressing the triple crisis, in: H. Wittman, A.A.
Desmarais and N. Wiebe (eds) Food Sovereignty: Reconnecting Food, Nature and Community. Oakland, CA:
Food First Books, pp. 168–185.
McMichael, P. (2012) Food regime crisis and revaluing the agrarian question, in: R. Almas and H. Campbell
(eds) Rethinking Agricultural Policy Regimes: Food Security, Climate Change and the Future Resilience of
Global Agriculture. Bingley: Emerald Group Publishing, pp. 99–122.
Perfecto, I. and Vandermeer, J. (2010) The agroecological matrix as alternative to the land-sparing/agriculture
intensification model, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(13), pp. 5786–5791.
Ploeg, J.D. va n der (2008) The New Peasantries: Struggles for Autonomy and Sustainability in an Era of Empire
and Globalization. London: Earthscan.
Ploeg, J.D. va n der (2010) The peasantry of the twentieth century: the commoditisation debate revisited,
Journal of Peasant Studies, 37(1), pp. 1–30.
Red de Semillas (2008) Resembrando e intercambiando. Published online
Rosset, P.M. and Altieri, M. (1997) Agroecology versus input substitution: a fundamental contradiction of
sustainable agriculture, Society and Natural Resources, 10(3), pp. 283–295.
Rosset, P., Sosa, B.M., Jaime, A.M.R. and Avila Lozano, D.R. (2011) The campesino-to-campesino agroecology
movement of ANAP in Cuba: social process methodology in the construction of sustainable peasant
agriculture and food sovereignty, Journal of Peasant Studies, 38(1), pp. 161–191.
Schneider, M. and McMichael, P. (2010) Deepening, and repairing, the metabolic rift, Journal of Peasant
Studies, 37(3), pp. 461–484.
Scialabba, N., Grandi, C. and Henatsch, C. (2002) Organic Agriculture and Genetic Resources for Food and
Agriculture. Rome: FAO. Published online
accessed 12 October 2011.
Soriano Niebla, J.J., Figueroa Zapata, M.G., Guzmán Casado, I. and Avila Cano, E. (1996) Desarrollo de
un centro de experimentación y producción de germoplasma para la agricultura ecológica en Andalucía, in: Sociedad Española de Agricultura Ecológica, Acta del II Congreso de la SEAE ‘Agricultura
ecológica y desarrollo rural’, Pamplona, September. Published online
.pdf>, accessed 26 September 2011.
Soriano Niebla, J.J., Guzmán Casado, G.I., García Jiménez, S.F., Figueroa Zapata, M. and Lora González, A.
(1998) Recuperación de variedades locales de hortalizas para su cultivo ecológico, in: Sociedad Española
de Agricultura Ecológica, Actas del III Congreso de la SEAE ‘Una alternativa para el mundo rural del tercer
milenio‘, Valencia, September. Published online
Swyngedouw, E. (2000) The Marxian alternative: historical-geographical materialism and the political
economy of capitalism, in: E. Sheppard and T.J. Barnes (eds) A Companion to Economic Geography. Oxford:
Blackwell Publishers, pp. 41–59.
Tovey, H. (2002) Alternative agriculture movements and rural development cosmologies, International
Journal of Sociology of Agriculture and Food, 10(1), pp. 1–11.
Vellvé, R. (1992) Saving the Seed: Genetic Diversity and European Agriculture. London: Earthscan.
Veteläinen, M., Negri, V. and Maxted, N. (2009) European Landraces: On Farm Conservation, Management,
and Use, Bioversity Technical Bulletin No. 15. Rome: Bioversity International.
Visser, B. (2002) An agrobiodiversity perspective on seed policies, in: N.P. Louwaa rs (ed.) Seed Policy, Legislation
and Law: Widening a Narrow Focus. Binghamtom NY: Food Products Press, pp. 231–245.
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