Seeds are the starting point for food production but the age old farmer seed system across Africa is being severely restricted by the actions of the World Bank. Guest author Graham Gordon explains how this is criminalising small-scale farms in Kenya, damaging the livelihoods of millions of people, and devastating crop diversity.
Small-scale agriculture is central in reducing extreme poverty, since 80 per cent of people living below the global poverty line are based in rural areas, and the vast majority of these depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. Small-scale farms are highly efficient, producing around 35 per cent of global food production on 12 per cent of agricultural land.
Seeds are the starting point for food production.
For thousands of years, this diversity has been developed by farmers growing crops and selecting seeds from the plants that grow best in their fields. This route is known as the ‘farmer seed system’ or the ‘informal’ seed sector. Across Africa, the farmer seed system provides around 80 per cent of farmers’ seeds. Women often play an important role in these systems, collecting and conserving traditional crop species and ensuring that crops planted contribute to a nutritious and diverse household diet.
The farmer seed system sits alongside the more ‘formal’ seed system, that focuses on ‘hybrid’ or commercial seeds. These hybrid seeds are usually developed by large agricultural companies for commercial purposes, are often dependent on artificial fertilisers and are protected through patents – backed by seed certification legislation.
But CAFOD’s recent report has shown how the farmer seed system is systematically being undermined by the concentration of power of large scale agribusiness and the promotion of the industrial agricultural model, affecting the livelihoods of millions of people.
Corporate control of seeds is undermining farmer choice and reducing resilience to shocks like food price rises and climate change
Seed markets are highly concentrated, with Bayer, Corteva, BASF and ChemChina/Syngenta controlling more than 50 per cent of the global commercial seed market. These same four companies also control more than 60 per cent of global agrochemical sales.
Using their monopolies, these companies concentrate on producing seeds for crops with large markets – mainly staples such as maize, wheat, soy and rice. This is having devastating impacts on crop diversity. Of the more than 6,000 edible plant species that we have cultivated over centuries, just nine crops now account for more than 65 per cent of all crop production. This has led to increased prices, and has significantly reduced farmers’ choice, and the resilience of farmers to shocks such as climate change.
Michael Fakhri, Special Rapporteur on the right to food (2022):
“This high concentration of corporate power allows a relatively small group to restrict people’s access to seeds, and to shape markets and innovation in a way that serves the ultimate goal of shareholder profit maximization and not the public good.”
The ability of companies to control the seed sector in different countries is underpinned by seed certification laws. The purpose of seed laws is to ensure the commercial seed sector works properly, through restricting which seeds are sold commercially. But they have the devastating impact of preventing farmers from developing, selling and using their own seeds because the certification process is expensive, time-consuming and out of their reach. There can also be criminal consequences for trading seeds that aren’t certified.
In Kenya a law was passed in 2012 that prohibits farmers’ rights to save, share, exchange or sell unregistered seeds. Farmers could face up to two years in prison and a fine of up to 1 million Kenyan shillings (equivalent to nearly four years’ wages for a farmer). In 2022, Kenyan smallholder farmers launched a legal case against the government calling for reform of the 2012 seed law to stop criminalising them for sharing seeds.
Veronica Kiboino, a farmer from Baringo County, Kenya (2022):
“I cannot afford to purchase seeds for every planting season. With indigenous seeds I am sure I can get the seeds I need, when I need them. Why does the government want to oppress smallholder farmers by abolishing the use of indigenous seeds? Indigenous seeds represent our culture, our people’s way of life, a rich tradition that has been handed down from generation to generation. The government should amend these punitive seed laws and allow us to freely share and sell indigenous seeds.”
World Bank policy conditionality reinforces the concentration of power of global seed companies
It is common knowledge that multinationals focus on profit, and seek intellectual property laws to protect their investments, but the role of the World Bank is less well known.
CAFOD’s research into seed laws in Africa found that the World Bank, which should be on the side of the poorest people and communities, is the cheerleader of this one-size-fits-all approach to seed certification laws that effectively give large scale agribusiness monopolistic control over seed markets in many countries.
By trawling through World Bank documents from the past 15 years, we found that the Bank promotes intensified industrial agriculture by insisting on two ‘prior actions’ that need to be completed before countries receive agricultural loans.
Firstly, the World Bank pushes subsidies to farmers that are linked to buying hybrid seeds and corresponding chemical fertilisers, for example in Mali in 2017, Niger in 2018, Kenya in 2019 and Guinea in 2020. This not only destroys the environment but the hybrid seeds and fertiliser package ends up being unaffordable for many farmers, as well as reducing their choice and resilience to shocks. Secondly, the Bank requires the implementation of seed certification laws that limit small farmers’ ability to grow, save, share and sell seeds, for example in Central African Republic, Chad, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Mozambique and Nigeria.
World Bank staff have repeatedly raised concerns about the viability of this model in internal papers and evaluations over the past decades, yet it remains the dominant approach, based on a persistent narrative that the only way to feed the world is through intensified agriculture.
This approach undermines the World Bank’s mission to end extreme poverty, as well as its focus on climate change. If agriculture is to achieve its transformational potential for poverty, climate and biodiversity, this approach needs to change.
So what can be done?
CAFOD has launched a Fix the food System campaign where we are calling on the World Bank to stop imposing restrictive seed laws on countries as conditions for financial support. The UK government gives significant funding to the World Bank, so needs to hold it accountable for its actions.
Secondly, we need a massive shift in funding away from industrial agriculture approaches towards supporting small-scale farmers and agroecological methods. A recent report by a UK government aid watchdog showed that UK government aid to agriculture has been effective in reducing poverty where it focused on small-scale farmers, yet agricultural aid is now largely being channeled to support large agribusiness, where there is little evidence of poverty impact.
Finally, we need to prioritise public investment in farmers’ seed systems that will increase food diversity, nutrition and resilience to shocks such as climate change and global supply chain challenges.
Graham Gordon is Head of Policy at CAFOD, the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, UK. He has 25 years’ experience in international development and advocacy work, focusing on a range of issues including food systems, climate change and global governance.
