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Agrobiodiversity, Intellectual Property Rights and Right to Food: The Case of Andean Countries

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Book cover Law and Agroecology

Abstract

This essay provides a knowledge contribution in order to understand the relationship between agrobiodiversity, intellectual property rights and the right to food in the context of Andean “Nuevo Constitucionalismo.” The distinctive feature of this regulatory experience is that Andean constitutions are ecologically oriented and they ensure some tools to guarantee respect for the right to food not only in terms of quantity but also in terms of quality. To achieve this goal, these countries have introduced in constitutional texts the principle of “food sovereignty,” which holds back the danger of monopoly patents over seeds and promotes the preservation of local agrobiodiversity, which is particularly concentrated in the area.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    FAO (1999), September 1999, p. 4.

  2. 2.

    Frankel et al. (1995), p. 40.

  3. 3.

    Agrobiodiversity can be defined as an interdisciplinarity science, such as agroecology: see Dalgaard et al. (2003), pp. 39–51.

  4. 4.

    Probably at the beginning of the 1990s, with the stipulation of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) signed Rio de Janeiro on 5 June 1992 at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (the Rio “Earth Summit”). The need for an ecological conversion of agriculture is well described by Gliessman and Rosemeyer (2010).

  5. 5.

    United Nation Conference on Trade and Development (1996).

  6. 6.

    On the relation between agrobiodiversity, the right to food and farmers’ seed systems, see De Schutter (2009).

  7. 7.

    Shiva (2005), pp. 3 et seqq; see also Shiva (2001), p. 22.

  8. 8.

    Glenn (2010), pp. 140 et seqq, refers to the chthonic legal tradition such as an ecological tradition. See also Goldsmith (1992), p. XVIII.

  9. 9.

    The “Via Campesina” is the international movement, born in 1993, that brings together millions of peasants, small and medium-size farmers, landless people, women farmers, indigenous people, migrants and agricultural workers from 73 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Americas. It defends small-scale sustainable agriculture as a way to promote social justice and dignity.

  10. 10.

    Article 25, paragraph I of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations, December 10, 1948.

  11. 11.

    It is a commission established under Resolution 1985/17 of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of 28 May 1985 and composed of independent experts to oversee the implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

  12. 12.

    Barbas (1985), pp. 75–78.

  13. 13.

    Acuäna (1983), p. 13. http://www.bdigital.unal.edu.co. Accessed 14 Sept 2014.

  14. 14.

    Bolivar (2000). See also Salcedo (1982), pp. 154–193.

  15. 15.

    See De la Reza (2010).

  16. 16.

    See Valadés (2003), pp. 471 et seqq.

  17. 17.

    Fundación Pachamama, Recogniting Rights for Nature in the Ecuadorian Constitution, p 3. http://www.therightsofnature.org/wp-content/uploads/pdfs/Recogniting-Rights-for-Nature-in-the-Ecuadorian-Constitution-Fundacion-Pachamama.pdf.

  18. 18.

    See Acosta and Martínez (2005).

  19. 19.

    See Zaffaroni (2012), pp. 422–434; Bagni (2013). See also Weber (2011), pp. 13 et seqq; Lanni (2011), p. 80, note 146.

  20. 20.

    See Carducci (2012), pp. 323–324.

  21. 21.

    The term “food sovereignty” was introduced in 1996 by the international peasant movement Via Campesina, at its meeting in Tlaxcala (Mexico), and reaffirmed in the forum parallel to the World Food Summit in Rome. It finds a definitive elaboration in the Declaration of Nyéléni 2007 during the International Forum on Food Sovereignty in Mali. See Corrado (2010), pp. 23–26; Patel (2009), pp. 663–706.

  22. 22.

    See also Rubio (2010).

  23. 23.

    See Cavazzani (2008), pp. 43–47.

  24. 24.

    See Carrión and Herrera (2012).

  25. 25.

    Cfr. Vargas Lima (2012), pp. 251–267.

  26. 26.

    See Ormachea (2008).

  27. 27.

    Parker (2008), pp. 121–143.

  28. 28.

    Andean “nuevo constitucionalismo” is different from the “neoconstitucionalismo,” which has affected the post-Second War constitutions, resulting in some changes in constitutional theory and the functioning of the rule of law. On this topic, see Carbonnel (2003).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Legal Sciences, University of Salento, Lecce, Italy

    M. Pierri

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  1. M. Pierri
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Correspondence to M. Pierri .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Scienze Giuridiche, Università del Salento, Lecce, Italy

    Massimo Monteduro

  2. Dipartimento di Scienze Giuridiche; Institute for the History of Law, Università del Salento; University of Münster, Münster, Germany, Lecce, Italy

    Pierangelo Buongiorno

  3. Dipartimento di Scienze Giuridiche, Università del Salento, Lecce, Italy

    Saverio Di Benedetto

  4. Dipartimento di Storia, Societ a e Studi sull’Uomo, Università del Salento, Lecce, Italy

    Alessandro Isoni

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Pierri, M. (2015). Agrobiodiversity, Intellectual Property Rights and Right to Food: The Case of Andean Countries. In: Monteduro, M., Buongiorno, P., Di Benedetto, S., Isoni, A. (eds) Law and Agroecology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-46617-9_24

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