Abstract
This chapter presents a case study at the local level in Ethiopia. It begins by showing that some farmers in the Oromia region have switched from planting locally adapted seeds for food barley to externally sourced seeds for commercial malt barley production, suggesting a loss of seed sovereignty. However, it also shows that the same farmers are continuing to plant their traditional food barley seeds in segregated plots, thereby maintaining seed sovereignty. It discusses why the Ethiopian government encouraged a shift from food to malt barley production following pressure from international corporate and commercial interests and why the government has allowed local farmers to continue to exercise seed sovereignty over some of their land. These practices are consistent with a transformationalist interpretation of seed sovereignty.
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Notes
- 1.
Middle-income status according to the World Bank (2013) is defined as one with a gross national income (GNI) per capita of around US $1430. By 2011 Ethiopia’s GNI stood at US $1105 for population of approx. 85 million (Ayenew 2014, p. 14). The population is now estimated to be 104 million http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/ethiopia-population/ [accessed online 2/6/2017].
- 2.
Such personnel had already been engaged for the preceding years with ASARECA, CAADP and other USAID -funded regional initiatives aimed at harmonising seed laws and opening up economies to liberalisation of the private-sector markets for key seed and crop commodities, which vastly benefit private breeders and bigger corporations over the public sector.
- 3.
Founded by one of the Rockefeller family in 1986, and benefitting from considerable funding from BMGF , Rockefeller and USAID amongst others.
- 4.
GTP1 Transformation Agenda work relating to ‘Systems’ is important, which included the crucial and connected areas of seed, soil, cooperatives and market transformational agendas (ATA Report 2013).
- 5.
This was backed by a government donor (Ireland Aid) through a bilateral aid programme with Ethiopia .
- 6.
https://issuu.com/self_help_africa/docs/ethiopia_country_profile__feb_2016 [accessed online 22/12/2016].
- 7.
SHA Manager explains that two or more PCs make a union and two or more unions make a federation.
- 8.
Rahmato explains that “under the Federal system the country is divided into 9 major ethnic-based administrative units called killils in Amharic. The lowest unit is the kebele or sub-district and above it the woreda or district level” (Rahmato 2014, p. 223).
- 9.
- 10.
This included provision of its basic services and the Food Security net for seven million people.
- 11.
Agricultural exports from sub-Saharan Africa were predominantly primary commodities, with low value-added and decreased from 10% to 3% in the last four decades (World Bank 2007, p. 2).
- 12.
2005–2015 Average growth rate of 7% per annum (PM Desalegn in ATA 2015, p. 3).
- 13.
Christopher Clapham highlights how Ethiopia’s swift backing of the US ‘global war on terror’ gave it “scope to promote its own agenda” (Clapham 2009, p. 181), effectively presented itself as “a force for stability in the region” (ibid., p. 190) and insulated it against possible loss of US support which it required for military protection of its border interests to the North in Eritrea and to the South in Somalia, all of which fed into US interests also to neutralise Islamist elements (ibid.).
- 14.
Some of these studies were the eight diagnostic studies funded and conducted by the BMGF (2008–2010) prior to the inception of the ATA in 2010.
- 15.
New Investment was announced for Ethiopia at the Global Agriculture and Food Security Symposium in 2012. It was hosted by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and World Economic Forum .
- 16.
The G8 NAFSN was launched in 2012 to mobilise private capital for investment in African agriculture. According to AFSA and GRAIN (2015, p. 4) “to be accepted into the programme, African governments are required to make important changes to their land and seed policies. The New Alliance prioritises granting national and TNCs new forms of access and control to the participating countries’ resources, and gives them a seat at the same table as aid donors and recipient governments”.
- 17.
Diageo has a connection with Africa dating back to ‘the first recorded exports of Guinness to Sierra Leone in 1827 and employs over 5000 people on the African continent, one in four of its workforce worldwide’ (Diageo press release 18 May 2012 [accessed online 7/10/2015]).
- 18.
Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) was the dominant element in the formation of the EPRDF .
- 19.
“Since 2003, the Federal Government has embarked on a new measure … and rural land registration and certification is underway in four regional states of Amhara, Tigray , Oromia and SNNPR” (AGP 2015, p. 65), which amongst other things would “facilitate land use planning and management” (ibid.), all dismantling traditional community systems in favour of commercial ones.
- 20.
There has been much concern regarding the 2005 and 2010 elections. The EU claimed the 2010 election failed to meet international standards (EU quoted in Fiseha 2014, p. 84–85).
- 21.
According to Negussie, the main opposition party Adinet “openly criticised the government at public rallies in recent times for using these forums to silence the public” (Negussie 2014, p. 185).
- 22.
“Land users have use rights over the plots they hold, and these plots cannot be sold or mortgaged” (Rahmato et al. 2013, p. 127).
- 23.
Ninety-seven per cent of the population still rely on heterogeneous, non-commodified, informal seed systems. This is “‘local seed’, carried over from the previous harvest, either by the farmers themselves (through the traditional on-farm selection process, whereby the farmer identifies next years seed stock while it is still maturing in the field and gives it special protection) or by buying from preferred seed stock kept by other farmers in the same locality” (Alemu 2011, p. 70, quoting FAO and WFP 2008). Even the formal sector remains predominantly in the public sector, unlike other countries, where ‘formal’ usually implies private-sector ownership or control.
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O’Grady Walshe, C. (2019). The Ethiopian Highlands: The Exercise of Seed Sovereignty at the Local Level. In: Globalisation and Seed Sovereignty in Sub-Saharan Africa. International Political Economy Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-12870-8_6
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