Key pact to save crop diversity

ROME, JULY 1.The U.N. world food body reached a landmark agreement today to try to save the world's diversity of agricultural crops, officials said.

The pact followed an anguished debate pitting many poor countries and environmentalists against multinational corporations and wealthier nations.

After a week of touch-and-go talks, delegates said the United States had agreed for the first time in a public forum to mandatory payments by plant breeders and geneticists developing new crop varieties in return for access to public seed banks.

The seed banks lend out crop seeds at no charge, enabling research into new varieties of plants to increase resistance to disease and ameliorate some of the impact of global warming. In turn, this helps alleviate hunger in poorer nations.

``This international undertaking is a milestone - it will allow the conservation of genetic resources for future generations,'' Jose Esquinas-Alcazar, Secretary of the Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, part of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), told Reuters.

He said an international agreement to conserve plant genetic resources was needed because agricultural biodiversity was being lost at an alarming rate.

No consensus on patents

The biggest stumbling block was always the patents issue and after much agonised discussion, the meeting decided not to adopt a clause on Intellectual Property Rights that limit access to seeds. The issue will be tackled instead by an FAO conference in November. Environmental groups say the patenting of food and seeds by multinational companies threatens food security and access by farmers to genetic resources.

- Reuters

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Section  : International
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