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The Forthcoming Seed Act : As You Sow So They Reap?
S. Majhi
In Print Version: May 2006
ABP, one of the country's leading media corporate houses has warned the govt sternly: “Already, the Indian state has lost effective control over vast swathes of land to radical political outfits. Imagine the weapon the seeds act will give such outfits. No farmer will stand up for a state which seems to have abandoned all interest in him and is allied with big business interests.” [THE TELEGRAPH, Wednesday, April 27, 2005] That article of columnist Mr. Samantak Das had a short annotation next to the heading, “The Indian government seems oblivious to the dangers that the seeds bill presents to food security and farmers' interests.” Needless to say that the govt was neither oblivious nor asleep while it tabled the bill; the columnist and/or the editorial staff who inserted that line may remain sure. Or, … well, please sirs, don't try to project the govt as an innocent child or an abruptly Alzheimer struck guy. The govt, which was quite ably handling the Patent Bill and the ‘Left' Parties, and aptly got it done securing the “left” votes necessary in the parliament to pass that Patent Law, which some critics aptly branded as IPR+ for the Indian Patent Act being more severe than the post-IPR patent acts as suggested by the WTO regime; that very same UPA govt did place the seed bill entirely deliberately; and will have that passed too in the houses of the parliament with “left” support – naturally with some cosmetic changes, just some manoeuvrings in languages here and there. [The www.indlaw. com in its pages of Policy Updates, informed (dated 10.05.05) “The Seeds Bill, 2004 … has been referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture, headed by Prof. Ram Gopal Yadav, Member of Parliament, for examination and report. … The Committee, therefore, invite written memoranda … … within 30 days of the date of the advertisement, indicating inter-alia whether they would also be interested in giving oral evidence before the Committee.” The govt was eager to pass the bill in the last monsoon session. But it seems that lack of ‘internal' preparations is delaying its arrival.] Ms. Suman Sahai, in her lead article in the Ed-page of the Times Of India [Friday, March 25, 2005] was as critical as Mr. Samantak Das and wrote: “One gets a sense that the seed industry, which has not concealed its unhappiness over the distinctly pro-farmer provisions of the Protection of Plant Variety and Farmers' Rights Act, 2001 (PPVFR), has succeeded in knocking the stuffing out of the Act. Worse, the government has elected to sideline the PPVFR and make the Seed Bill the dominant legislation, sending the signal that in the seed sector, it is the industry that will hold sway, not farmers.” Though Ms Sahai should have written that those “distinctly pro-farmer provisions” of the aforesaid PPVFR were all eyewashes.
What is there in this bill? Ms. Bandana Shiva gave a detail criticism in the pages of her www.navdanya.org and called it anti-national. The bill has such provisions as “13. (1) No seed of any kind or variety shall, for the purpose of sowing or planting by any person, be sold unless such seed is registered …” etc, which clearly, explicitly say that peasants are forbidden to grow their own seeds or exchange them; only big seed companies, naturally mostly MNC ones, are allowed in seed selling. And we are already seeing an ad-blitzkrieg by the govt in the print media insisting peasants and farmers to buy only registered seeds. Mr. Samantak Das gave a précised account: The bill's stated objective includes“increasing the use of quality seeds in comparison with farmers' saved seeds”; facilitating a “climate of growth” for “the private seed industry”; “regulation of sale of seeds and increasing the availability of quality seed for sowing”; “increasing private participation in seed production, distribution, certification and seed testing”; and “liberalized import of seed and planting materials compatible with World Trade Organization commitments.” Ms. Sahai adds, “The industry gets its way with seed pricing in the Seed Bill; there is no mechanism to regulate seed supply or seed price”; “Besides, the stringent punishment and large penalties in the PPVFR for supplying bad seeds have been reduced to a token affair. A major setback is in the dilution of the liability and compensation provisions. According to the PPVFR, farmers who have suffered losses because of poor quality seed can get relief from the Plant Variety Authority. In other words, the national authority is responsible for ensuring that the industry pays compensation to farmers. In the Seed Bill, both government and industry have distanced themselves and placed the onus for seeking compensation on the farmers themselves. Now, the farmers must
struggle as best as they can in the district consumer courts to seek redress.” But at the end of the article her final advice was just refer the bill to a Joint Parliamentary Committee!!
A horrific picture presented indeed. The ‘Left' intelligentsia may quiver at this new ‘imperialist' attack – an outcome of the WTO regime, etc. But much harm to indigenous and age-old seed-varieties had been done well before the WTO was born or conceived. And it was done by the much hyped and praised and right-‘left'-practised-by-all “Green Revolution”– a ‘revolution' with counterrevolutionary intentions!
Genetic Imperialism
A scientist, Shuvro Ketan Basu, wrote an article in the reputed radical Bangla monthly journal ANEEK, in its Jan 2001 issue, named “Genetic Imperialism”. There he affirmed that before the advent of the green revolution almost 40,000 varieties of rice were available in India, whereas, now an exhaustive search can rescue a remainder of merely or less than 2000 varieties of them! Where have all the remaining 38,000 gone? They were conspiratorially eliminated; the apparent story being that huge supply of HYV [Lab-made hybrid] seeds flooded the market, which did give, in short-term, higher yields with chemical fertilisers-insecticides-pesticides; unheard-of ‘summer paddies' came, and diesel / electric pumps lifted millions of gallons of water from deep levels… the old traditional seeds were eliminated by ‘free choices' in a ‘free market' and reached extinction totally within a decade or two. But a large part of those lost seeds are now at the custody of IBPGR – the International Board of Plant Genetic Resources – an organisation founded by the Ford Foundation & the Rockfeller Foundation, which with the aid of the infrastructure of the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the UN [FAO – Rome] has collected over a hundred thousands of germplasms or genetic-grouping pattern samples; and contrary to the agreement, never gave the governments parts of each of the samples collected from their respective countries. All those genetic codes are now imperialist property. The big food corporate houses can ‘buy' them for their researches. The IBPGR, through its sources, collected more than 5,000 varieties of rice seeds from the state of Assam only in the ‘60s! Actually much of these robberies were done by some ‘sources' of the Rockfeller & Ford combine, starting form a time when even the IBPGR had not born. The IBPGR now has enough samples of over a quarter of all gene pools of all the bio diversities of the world. And no govt of the third world has any say over IBPGR affairs. So, the Seed Bill is just an clever successor or able heir of the Green Revolution, and in no way the seed bill is much more demonic than its criminal ancestor. [The present author begs to be forgiven if the spelling ‘germplasms' is wrong.]
Evils Committed and Agonies Implanted by the Green Revolution
Before passing on to the seed bill again, let us recollect here some of the evils committed and agonies implanted by the Green Revolution. Years of chemicalisation of the green fields has worsened to extreme the quality and fertility of soil; the micro organisms, earthworms, all died out; many helpful insects were wiped out; the soil needed more and more chemical fertilisers and mechanical traction by diesel, and became more and more dependent on other chemicals, and lately, micro nutrients [anukhadya] bio-fertiliser combined with heavier doses of chemical ones; the land, water, and bio cycles dependent on them, all got polluted; the sub soil water layer sank down further and further; while the old seed varieties – more resistant to insects and pests due to resistant powers obtained by centuries of evolution, needing less water and no ever-increasing chemical inputs at all – became extinct; … …the ‘blessings' of the Green Revolution are too countless to write in a small Para! And nobody told the peasants that – (1) given some additional chemical fertilisers along with traditional bio ones one could yield as high or higher yield with the traditional seeds, but then the chemical giants couldn't profit – researchers like Dr. R.H. Rechharia and Prof. R.L. Bramhachary have shown that; and (2) the ex-chemical engineer-turned-agro-scientist of Japan, Masanobu Fukuwaka, [felicitated by ‘Deshikottama' by the Vishwa Bharati University] was able to yield, in short and long term, more rice, etc. than ‘chemically farmed' farms in Japan, those very farms having astonishingly ‘high' yield in the world, solely with traditional seeds and total organic cultivation practice, even without using standing water in rice fields! Surely, further researches along those lines could have saved the third world, and the world too; but researches in India and abroad were, by then, monopolised and controlled by the trans-national corporate sector, the sponsors of labs and higher learning institutions; even they had Dr. Rechharia thrown out of top-govt job! [Sources – that same article of Aneek.] The same fate met the eminent engineer Mr. Kapil Bhattacharjee, who contradicted the govt on imperialist-friendly big dams like The DVC and Farakka Barrages; in addition, who even was described once as a ‘Pak' crony by the ABP! The Green Revolution story had the sad and cruel end — Seeds of thousands of varieties, evolved through centuries of evolutionary resistant powers and hard & conscious labour of the peasantry were doomed to extinction. Now the new Seed Act threatens the remaining.
Now, what will happen to the so-called “farmers' right” on seeds after the seed bill is enacted? Mr. Das in his column in The Telegraph added: Defenders of the seeds bill may point to chapter IX, clause 43, which apparently protects farmers' rights. This clause begins by stating, “Nothing in this Act shall restrict the right of the farmer to save, use, exchange, share or sell his farm seeds and planting material” but then qualifies this by adding “except that he shall not sell such seed or planting material under a brand name or” — and then, the knockout punch — “which does not conform to the minimum limit of germination, physical purity, genetic purity prescribed”. These clauses empower the central seed committee to specify “minimum limits of germination, genetic and physical purity, and maximum seed health, with respect to any seed of any kind or variety” and to demand that such data be indicated “on the packet or container” by the producer. Which farmer has the technical know-how to do this? All that most farmers know of their own seed varieties is that they germinate and yield good crops in local conditions. Now, unless they can provide technical proof of their seeds' genetic purity and health, they cannot exchange or sell such seeds at all. No such problems exist for seed companies, with their corps of scientists and well-equipped laboratories, never mind if their hybrid seeds fail to show yield stability and contain a range of genetic impurities…. … Not only this much — if somebody says that in a vast country like India with a near billion population, how the Seed Companies or the Govt will police if one doesn't follow that act! — s/he may rest assured that the ‘corporate policing' is already alarming in the west [one may read example in Vancouver Post as cited in the Aneek article], and the FBI is already here in India, etc. Policing is, well, not the most deadly weapon in their hands; they can manipulate the ‘free-market' in such a way as to ‘oust' things they don't want; their ‘technology' is their weapon too – e.g., the so called ‘Terminator' and ‘Varminator' GM [genetically modified] seeds can slow poison all nearby fields through pollination, etc.
Lets get back to the Seed Bill again. Mr. Das carries on: If such seeds fail, the producer can claim compensation under the Consumer Protection Act, but what are the chances of a farmer in a remote area actually receiving such compensation? And in how many years' time? As for the producer, he can be fined a maximum of Rs 50,000, in the most extreme cases — a laughable sum for large seed companies. …So there is our UPA govt's seed bill waiting to become an act. Mr. Das ends his elucidating column by: “Two final comments: Several provisions of the proposed act are in conflict with the Biodiversity Act and abrogate the right of Indian farmers to save, breed, use and exchange seeds of indigenous crop varieties. Two, there has been no attempt by the government to communicate even the basic features of this proposed act to the farmers. The bill is in English, a language alien to most of our farmers, and no effort has been made to translate it into the major Indian languages or have public debates on it. Even the media has been left in the dark.
“Thus we could well be heading into a future where something as basic as the food we eat will be determined by trans-national commercial interests and not by what the people of India want. By the time we wake up to this, we may well have lost our food security and sovereignty over our nation's agricultural resources.” But Mr. Das, and also the ‘Left' intelligentsia must reckon with the fact that the patent act passed by the parliament recently, and the so called bio diversity act, leave enough space for mishandling by those TNC giants. [Even the New York Times, a vehement advocate of the interests of the US trans-nationals, conceded in a January 18 editorial that India's patent legislation could have a serious adverse impact on the health of “hundreds of millions of people in India and worldwide.” “These rules,” said the Times, “have little to do with free trade and more to do with the lobbying power of the American and European pharmaceutical industries.” – Kranti Kumara, India Adopts WTO Patent Law With Left Front Support, gl-kumara 180405.htm in www.countercurrents.org]
Much before the tabling of the bill, the food-security was under threat; food production is in decline; and the peasants and farmers knew it well through their practice that with HYV seed that — already now, you cannot go on cultivating with seeds produced by multiple plant-generations, their fertility and yield decline after a few cycles, then you need to buy certified seeds or their first generation daughter seeds again – the same happen to the artificially bred domestic animals – you can use milking cows ‘profitably' for maximum 8 home-grown generations from original hybrid/artificial ones – for HYV potatoes, you cannot use daughter seeds of fourth generation, etc. The so-called “Farmers' Right” is already badly curtailed by the HYV invasion, Mr. Das!!
The pro-‘Left' house of ‘The Hindu' in its ‘Frontline' added cautiously: When the weak win a skirmish against the giants, they can be forgiven for feeling so elated as to think that they have won the war. The recent passage of the Bill to amend the Indian Patents Act, under pressure from the Left parties, marks the first step in the attempt to stem the pressure on India to orient its patent laws in favour of giant pharmaceutical companies. [Frontline: March 12-25, 2005, article of V. Sridhar & Siddharth Narrain.] Ridiculous indeed – the one of the last nails in the coffin of ‘sovereignty' in this field was described as the ‘first step'!! As for example, the Patent Amendment Bill enacted by the UPA contains,‘Drugs that were being produced and marketed by Indian companies before January 1, 2005 can continue to produce them after paying a reasonable royalty' [quoted from the same article of The Frontline] – without mentioning at all what is meant by reasonable! So many other loopholes are there, and still the authors of that article chose such a heading as – “A Tempered Patents Regime”! Indeed the ‘Left's are now enough tempered, moderated with imperialist-capitalist machinations. It also shows what awaits the green fields – just some cosmetic variation on something prescribed by their ‘big brothers', their praiseworthy ‘investors' – the TNC giants. But remember, all of you gentlemen, you will be liable for turning the green field red!!!
We may recall here some facts for those ‘Left' intelligentsia:
# when the last rounds of talks were going on in the Uruguay round of GATT, the then govt led by VP Singh was their ‘friendly' govt, which didn't disclose publicly anything about the imminent danger;
# the ‘Lefts' raised ‘hue and cry' over the ‘Dunkel Proposals', ‘TRIPS' etc, did always ‘walk out' from the parliament when the then Congress govt was still in minority to help the govt pass anything it wanted in the parliament; and only ‘protested vehemently' or ‘voted against' after the govt got a solid ground – thus these ‘lefts' paved way for the ‘new economic regime' smoothly;
# and when again their ‘friendly govt' of the ‘third front' came, even including CPI minister[s] they didn't demand scrapping the pro-imperialist WTO treaties by their govt; and
# by that time the CPIM was enough ‘learned' to think that one need to abide by the facts of life like the WTO. This time also all the parliamentary parties will do their best so that the passage of the bill can be smooth enough, obviously with some ‘stage shows' and ‘powders and paints'.
On the other hand, one of the main or basic tasks of the ensuing revolution of India is to put an end to all kinds of imperialist slavery including tolerating the WTO, even at the cost of isolation for some short or longer time.
That sometimes isolations come as ‘blessings' may be traced from recent history of Cuba, at least up to year 1999-2000: after the collapse of “Soviet Russia” the Russian green-revolutionary almost-free imports stopped, US encirclement isolated them; but slowly and painfully the Cubans changed back to more and more organic farming only to their good; for farm animals too they had to and successfully- though-painfully did change; they became, in some respect, self-reliant. Bigger countries with bigger land and human resources like India can accomplish transition to self-reliance and ecologically good cultivation practices more easily than Cuba.
PS: 1. Hope the readers got a message obliquely from this article that the Marxists do not treat ‘technologies' as ‘colourless', rather they probe the class characters [and effects on humanity and nature] of those. Though Marxists are always blamed for ‘technology-fetishism', it was Marx who almost a century and half back tried to make clear the effects of ‘Machinery and Modern Industry' on humanity and nature in the same named chapter of the Capital, volume 1; interested readers may read the last section of that chapter, and then, one can go through the Chapter 2, Part 3 of Anti Dühring by Engels. Also a recent very worthy book is there: Marx's Ecology, by John Bellamy Foster, a Monthly Review Press [NY] publication, [published in India by Cornerstone Publications, P.O. Hijli Co-operative, Kharagpur, 721 306, ph-03222-277438].
2. About “Rice Imperialism” in recent years, readers may go through an article of Mathew Clement in Monthly Review, Feb. 2004 [same Indian publisher]. The article by Fred Magdoff, ‘A Precarious Existence', in that same issue titled “Cultivating Profit, Harvesting Poverty” is also very contextual and, well, worthy, (minus several concluding Paragraphs). 02.08.05