The eight SAARC member countries were present at the recently concluded “Learning Exchange on Community Engagement on Seed Sovereignty for Resilient Agriculture in South Asia” held in Dhaka and in Rural Development Academy (RDA) in Bogura, Bangladesh.
Government representatives from eight SAARC countries and four Farmer Organization (FO) representatives participated in the workshop. Also present in the event are Bangladeshi government officials, SAARC Agriculture Center (SAC), seed experts from South Asia, CSOs and development partners.
During the forum, seed situation and the future of food security in South Asia were discussed from perspectives of the different sectors present in the event. The delegates also visited Maria Village where they were given an interactive demonstration of Maria Model of seed technology.
The event is organized by AFA, La Via Campesina and SAC, hosted by ActionAid Bangladesh (AA), Kendrio Krishok Moitree (KKM), RDA and Coast Trust Bangladesh, and is supported by MTCP2, IFAD, SDC and Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Netherlands.
GALLERY
PRESENTATIONS
Plenary Contextual Framework – Seed and the future of food security in South Asia
- Seed System in South Asia: Situation, Policies, Programs and Challenges – Dr. Pradyumna Raj Pandey, SAARC Agriculture Centre (SAC)
- The Seed Situation at the Global Level – Md. Shahjanhan Ali, Seed Technologist and Seed Regulation Specialist
- Farmers’ Rights: International Recognition – Juanita Chaves Posada, GFAR
- Strengthening Local Seed Systems and Promoting Conservation & Use of Agricultural Biodiversity in Nepal – Dr. Keshab Khadka, ANFPA, MTCP2
Presentation on Country prospect of community seed situation (national focal point from Member states and FOs)
- Afghanistan GO – Abdullah Abed, Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock
- Bangladesh FO – KKM
- Bangladesh GO – Krishibid Kazi Md. Shaiful Islam, Department of Agricultural Extension
- Bhutan – Deepak Rai, National Seed Center
- India FO & GO – Dr. GAK Kumar, ICAR – National Rice Research Institute / Naimisha Joshi & Vasantiben Parmar, SEWA
- Maldives GO – Mariyam Vishama Ahmed, Ministry of Fisheries and Agriculture
- Nepal FO
- Nepal GO – Narayan Kumar Shrestha, Ministry of Agriculture, Land Management and Cooperatives
- Pakistan GO – Nazar Iqbal, Ministry of Natioanl Food Security and Research
- Sri Lanka FO – Lanka Farmer’s Forum
- Sri Lanka GO – R.A. Gamini Senarathna, Department of Agriculture
MARIA MODEL
Maria Model: Sustainable Food Security – Dr. AKM Zakaria
Seed Health Improvement – Dr. AKM Zakaria
RATIONALE
Agriculture started with the seed. Seeds are the heart of agriculture and the source of foodstuff. Apparently, seed is deeply associated with the whole food system including diversity, reliance and food security. The quality seed and seed security are twofold prime concerns for agricultural nations and farmers like South Asia. The seed security which includes all aspects of seed types, seed production and distribution appears as a major challenge in South Asian Agriculture particularly during disaster and acute seed crisis. Thus, the seed security is profoundly linked with livelihood of farmers.
Seeds are saved by farmers and exchanged among themselves and improved in accordance to local environmental conditions from time immemorial. The conventional knowledge, traditions and customs are also passed along with the process of seed exchange among farmers. However, phenomenon of saving of seeds and sharing of seeds among farmers has gradually changed with time due to changes in the seed systems. With rapid change of agriculture, traditional seed systems which were controlled by farmers have eventually moved to government sector plant breeders and further to private seed companies. This shift was caused mainly by technological advances such as hybridization and genetic improvement associated with green revolution. Legal protectants and property rights of seed production accelerated the shift, making the situation conducive for seed companies to earn more profits. Today, the majority of the seed market is controlled by a few giant multinational seed conglomerates. These big seed corporations continue to acquire many small scale seed companies in order to maintain the monopoly of seed business, in order to have more profits.
With the introduction of improved seed varieties and more importantly hybrid seeds, the companies successfully convinced farmers to keep on purchasing these commercial seeds year after year. This adversely affected the conventional seed saving, replanting and sharing process. The traditional knowledge on seed saving was also lost as farmers are refrained from such activities. As a consequence, the vulnerability of the farmers have been increasing rapidly, consequently making the farmers more marginalized. Further, the traditional knowledge of the farmers associated with seed is also jeopardized.
The seed research and seed production are confined only towards most profitable proprietary crops and varieties which in turn adversely affect seed diversity. Since 1990s, about 75 percent of agricultural crop genetic diversity has been lost as farmers have left multiple local varieties for genetically uniform high yielding varieties. Further, 90 percent of traditional crop varieties have also disappeared from farmer fields.
Based on the 2013 sales reports, the top seven firms control 71 percent of the world’s commercial seed market. The farmers are mostly dependent on market for their seeds. For example, in an average, 45 percent of Bangladesh farmers depend on company seeds (37% for rice, 28% for wheat, 89% for maize, 52% for potato, 86% for jute, 9% for pulses, 17% for oilseeds, 27% for spices and 60% for vegetables seeds). This situation is more or less similar in the South Asian countries.
Thus, change of seed systems towards more control of a fewer multinational companies and less control of the farmers has affected the genetic diversity as well as the farmers’ rights. Farmers have little scope to participate in the seed policy regime even if South Asia is a region with high plant diversity. There is an increase in seeds imported by South Asian countries, especially hybrid seeds which threaten the seed diversity and the seed sovereignty.
Seed sovereignty is a natural driver of local seed development and the development and maintenance of seed diversity. There are existing initiatives of farmers groups and organizations in meeting farmers’ demands for quality, affordable, accessible and resilient seeds through community seed banks, seed producer cooperatives and partnerships with seed companies. There are also research institutions, particularly the NARS who partner with farmers organizations in the production and distribution of quality seeds. Some governments have policies that help promoting seed sovereignty and access to quality and affordable seeds and the self-determination of a farmer to save, select and share seeds.
The SAARC
The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is the regional intergovernmental organization and geo political union of nations in South Asia. It was founded in Dhaka in 1985. Its secretariat is based in Kathmandu, Nepal. Its SAARC Agricultural Center is based in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Part of its official declaration during the 2014 summit reads:
“The Heads of State or Government agreed to increase investment, promote research and development, facilitate technical cooperation and apply innovative, appropriate and reliable technologies in the agriculture sector for enhancing productivity to ensure food and nutritional security in the region. They also underscored the importance of promoting sustainable agriculture. The Leaders directed to eliminate the threshold criteria from the SAARC Food Bank Agreement so as to enable the Member States to avail food grains, during both emergency and normal time food difficulty. The Leaders urged for early ratification of the SAARC Seed Bank Agreement and directed to constitute the Seed Bank Board, pending completion of ratification by all Member States. The Leaders also directed the relevant SAARC bodies to finalize the establishment of Regional Vaccine Bank and Regional Livestock Gene Bank.
The Leaders reiterated their strong commitment to free South Asia from poverty and directed the Ministerial and Secretary-level mechanisms on poverty alleviation to review the progress and revisit the SAARC Plan of Action and its effective implementation, also taking into account the Post-2015 Development Agenda. They recognized the potential of cooperatives in achieving inclusive, broad-based and sustainable economic growth and development, and called for sharing of experiences, expertise and best practices in this sector.”
CSO/FO Initiatives
Civil society groups in South Asia have taken initiatives to promote seed sovereignty and community seed banking in South Asia. Linking with that, farmers organizations, working together under the platforms catalysed by the project MTCP2 (Medium Term Cooperation Program Phase 2), supported by IFAD, SDC and EU, and managed by a consortium of AFA and LVC, with AFA as Grant Recipient, have initiated efforts to both respond to the issues of the farmers sector in South Asia, including on sustainable agriculture, fisheries and forestry. Through the MTCP2 project, FOs, are promoting integrated, diversified, organic farming and sustainable forestry/agro forestry and on establishing community seed banks among their local /sub national.
Partners
The collaborators or partners of the learning exchange programme are:
SAARC Agricultural Centre (SAC) is the first regional Centre established by the SAARC. The Centre started functioning in 1988 with a mandate for information management, primarily in the field of agriculture and allied discipline. With the passage of time, the Centre braced up broader challenges to make regional cooperation more responsive to the needs of the stakeholders and farming communities as South Asia heads for a new order of agricultural transformation. The SAARC Agriculture Centre thus has been given an enhanced mandate for agricultural research and development, policy planning, and knowledge management.
The Asian Farmers Association (AFA) established in 2002 is an alliance of national farmers’ organizations currently with 20 member organizations in 16 countries in Southeast, East, South and Central Asia with a combined membership of around 13 million small scale women and men farmers, fishers and indigenous peoples. AFA, in consortium with another peasant organization, La Via Campesina, is managing a USD 10 million valued five-year capacity building program for FOs called MTCP2 (Medium Term Cooperation Program Phase 2) supported by IFAD, SDC and EU. The program is being implemented in 20 countries in 3 sub regions of Asia: southeast, south and pacific. In South Asia, the MTCP2 is being implemented in 4 countries (Nepal, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka) by 48 national FOs and 450 sub national FOs
ActionAid (AA) is an international organization present in more than 40 countries in Africa, Asia, America and Europe. ActionAid has been developing various activities on sustainable agriculture with its partners – all of which have been influenced by several schools of thought from organic agriculture, agro-ecology, conservation agriculture, permaculture and conventional agriculture. ActionAid through its Human Rights Based Approach (HRBA) has included sustainable agriculture or agroecology as one of the integral components of its goal to ensure that poor people have sovereignty over their food and production systems.
OBJECTIVES
The aims of the exposure visit to share and learn from the experiences of various farmers’ organizations and government agricultural officers in promoting policies and programs for achieving seed sovereignty for resilient agriculture.
Specific objectives will include:
- Sharing: Share their initiatives, challenges and lessons learned in promoting sustainable seed management and seed sovereignty
- Capturing lessons learned:
- Identify technologies on sustainable seed management and draw out some guidelines on appropriate use of these technologies
- Identify key factors of success, key tips and guidelines in promoting the technologies for sustainable seed management and seed sovereignty
- Application of learning:
- Outline key action points that each Farmer Organizations and Agriculture Institutions (both at national and regional levels) will do in future to improve a particular aspect or facet in promoting seed sovereignty (e.g. better ways for community seed banking, seed producer cooperatives, partnership between Farmer Organization and research institutions, joint advocacy for a national seed policy)
- Provide recommendations for the relevant operationalization of SAARC Seed Bank and SAARC Seed Board
EXPECTED OUTPUTS
- Case studies on experiences on sustainable seed management and seed sovereignty
- Some indicators on what is a sustainable seed management and some guide on how to strengthen seed network among and between the countries
- Action plan from each national farmer organization/platform and Agriculture institutions for next 1 year describing how they will apply their learning
- Policy Recommendations at regional level to promote seed sovereignty
METHODOLOGY
Exchange visit, brief presentations, case study sharing, brain storming
National focal point expert nominated by each member country will prepare a brief report (5-10 pages) on “community based seed production, saving and exchange systems” in respective countries including history of seed saving, different seed saving communities and their institutional arrangements, seed saving methods, seed production and processing techniques, seed saving techniques, seed quality testing and seed exchange methods, governmental support for community seed saving programs, provisions in government seed acts and regulations for community engagements in seed systems, challenges and issues, success stories of community seed saving, suggestions and recommendations for improvement of community seed production, saving and exchange.
PARTICIPANTS
About 45-50 participants including 2 farmer representatives from each SAARC country (nominations will be received through AFA), 1 government extension officer from each SAARC countries (nominations will be received through SAARC Secretariat), 4 representatives from AFA-LVC, 4 representatives from SAC, 2 representatives from AAI, 3 representatives from RDA, 5 experts on seed sovereignty (SAARC member states), 2 Seed policy experts, representatives from development partners
Extension officer (Government employees) who are eligible to be nominated by SAARC member countries as well as farmer representatives to be nominated by MTCP2 FO partners should have practical experience in development of community based seed production and seed saving programs. Further, they must also have a considerable knowledge in national seed laws and seed acts.
PROGRAM SCHEDULE
| Time | Program Detail | |
| 8:45 | 9:10 | Registration |
| 9:10 | 10:30 | Opening Session:Chair: Dr. Md. Kabir Ikramul Haque, Executive Chairman BARC (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana)Welcome Address: Dr. S.M. Bokhtiar, Director SACIntroduction of the of ParticipantsOverview of the workshop and schedule: Ma. Esthella A. Penunia, Secretary General, AFARemarks by Ms. Shazada Begum, Vice Chairperson, Asian Farmers AssociationRemarks by the special guest: Farah Kabir, Country Director, Actionaid BangladeshRemarks by the chief guest: Mr. Ashraf Uddin Ahmed, Additional Secretary and Director General, Seed, MoA BangladeshAddress by the Chairperson: Dr. Md. Kabir Ikramul Haque, Executive Chairman BARC(Anchor by Dr. Susmita Das, Senior Documentation Officer AIC, BARC) |
| 10:40 | 11:00 | Coffee Break / Group Photo |
| 11:00 | 13:00 | Plenary Contextual Framework – Seed and the future of food security in South Asia:Chair: Mr. Anwar Faruque, Ex Secretary MoA, Bangladesh (Reporter: Ms. Sohana Sultana)1. The Seed System in South Asia: Situation, Policies and Programs, Challenges: Dr. Pradyuma Raj Pandey, SAC, Bangladesh2. The Seed Situation at the Global Level: Mr. Md. Shahjanhan Ali, Seed Technologist and Seed Regulation Specialist, Bangladesh3. The ITPGFRA and Farmers Rights: Thomas Price, GFAR, Italy (through Skype)4. CSO Initiatives in Promoting Seed Sovereignty in South Asia: Dr. Keshab Khadka, Senior Technical Adviser, MTCP2 South Asia, Nepal(Each presentation 15 mins/ Open discussion from the participants 30 mins) |
| 13.00 | 14.00 | Lunch Break |
| 14:00 | 20:00 | Travel from Dhaka to RDA by Air (Iftar on the way to RDA, Bogura) |
| 20.00 | 21.30 | Check in and welcome dinner at RDA, Bogura |
| Day 2, May 20, Sunday | |||
| 08.30 | 08:45 | Morning Energizers, Introduction of the Day’s session | Dr. Wickey |
| 8:45 | 11:30 | Chair: Mr. MA Motin, DG- RDA, (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana)Presentation on Country prospect of community seed situation (national focal point from Member states and FOs )(Each country presentation (GO & FO) 20 Mins and 5 Mins open discussion for each country )Tea and Coffee will be serve during the session | |
| 11:30 | 12:30 | Group work: Facilitating by Sheik Dastagir Shameem – Coordinator Women Rights AAI (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana)Country –level discussions for identifying the successful factors, lessons learned and application of the lessons learned from the presentationConsidering the seed situation/government initiatives/policy and laws for community seed management of country prospective by FO and focal point experts and presentation | Mr. Amir |
| 12.30 | 13.00 | Outcome of the group work by the facilitator with the support of rapporteur | |
| 13.00 | 14.00 | Lunch Break | |
| 14.00 | 14:30 | Presentation on Community initiatives (Maria Model) by Dr. AKM Zakaria Ex Director Training, RDA, Bogura | Mr. Helal |
| 14:30 | 17:30 | Field visit including travel (to familiarise Planning, production, processing, preservation, exchange systems, type and variety of seed, support received from government service providers, transportation and storageProduction and distribution system, relationship with different stakeholders, marketing system, profit margin and sustainability of seed production by the farmersBrief overview of the field visit by Dr. AKM Zakaria and Dr. Susmita Das | |
| 19:30 | 22:00 | Cultural program and Solidarity Dinner | |
| Day 3, May 21, Monday | |||
| Time | Program | Person-in-charge | |
| 09.00 | 10.30 | Ways Forward Facilitator: Ma. Esthella A. Penunia (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana)Brainstorming on the key lesson learned and identify way forward and planning of individual member countries and regional partners | Dr. Wickey |
| 10.30 | 11.00 | Tea and Coffee | |
| 11.00 | 12.00 | Closing Ceremony Chair: Mr. MA MatinSynthesis of 3 day discussion, field visit learning and recommendations drawn: Ma. Esthella A. Penunia, Ms. Sohana SultanaSpeech from guest of honour (15 mins each)Certificate distributionClosing speech form the chair | Dr. Pandey |
| 12.00 | 12.45 | Lunch Break | Mr. Helal and Mr. Amir |
| 13:00 | Check out RDA, Travel from RDA to Dhaka by Air and recheck in KIB(Dhaka, Bangladesh) | ||
A learning exchange on community engagement on seed sovereignty for resilient agriculture in South Asia will be held on 19-21 May 2018 in Rural Development Academy (RDA), Bogura, Bangladesh.
The forum will be participated by farmer representatives/farmers organizations from SAARC countries, government officials, SAARC Agriculture Center (SAC), seed experts, CSOs and development partners.
The event is organized by AFA, La Via Campesina and SAC, hosted by ActionAid Bangladesh (AA), Kendrio Krishok Moitree (KKM), RDA and Coast Trust Bangladesh, and is supported by MTCP2, IFAD, SDC and Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Netherlands.
RATIONALE
Agriculture started with the seed. Seeds are the heart of agriculture and the source of foodstuff. Apparently, seed is deeply associated with the whole food system including diversity, reliance and food security. The quality seed and seed security are twofold prime concerns for agricultural nations and farmers like South Asia. The seed security which includes all aspects of seed types, seed production and distribution appears as a major challenge in South Asian Agriculture particularly during disaster and acute seed crisis. Thus, the seed security is profoundly linked with livelihood of farmers.
Seeds are saved by farmers and exchanged among themselves and improved in accordance to local environmental conditions from time immemorial. The conventional knowledge, traditions and customs are also passed along with the process of seed exchange among farmers. However, phenomenon of saving of seeds and sharing of seeds among farmers has gradually changed with time due to changes in the seed systems. With rapid change of agriculture, traditional seed systems which were controlled by farmers have eventually moved to government sector plant breeders and further to private seed companies. This shift was caused mainly by technological advances such as hybridization and genetic improvement associated with green revolution. Legal protectants and property rights of seed production accelerated the shift, making the situation conducive for seed companies to earn more profits. Today, the majority of the seed market is controlled by a few giant multinational seed conglomerates. These big seed corporations continue to acquire many small scale seed companies in order to maintain the monopoly of seed business, in order to have more profits.
With the introduction of improved seed varieties and more importantly hybrid seeds, the companies successfully convinced farmers to keep on purchasing these commercial seeds year after year. This adversely affected the conventional seed saving, replanting and sharing process. The traditional knowledge on seed saving was also lost as farmers are refrained from such activities. As a consequence, the vulnerability of the farmers have been increasing rapidly, consequently making the farmers more marginalized. Further, the traditional knowledge of the farmers associated with seed is also jeopardized.
The seed research and seed production are confined only towards most profitable proprietary crops and varieties which in turn adversely affect seed diversity. Since 1990s, about 75 percent of agricultural crop genetic diversity has been lost as farmers have left multiple local varieties for genetically uniform high yielding varieties. Further, 90 percent of traditional crop varieties have also disappeared from farmer fields.
Based on the 2013 sales reports, the top seven firms control 71 percent of the world’s commercial seed market. The farmers are mostly dependent on market for their seeds. For example, in an average, 45 percent of Bangladesh farmers depend on company seeds (37% for rice, 28% for wheat, 89% for maize, 52% for potato, 86% for jute, 9% for pulses, 17% for oilseeds, 27% for spices and 60% for vegetables seeds). This situation is more or less similar in the South Asian countries.
Thus, change of seed systems towards more control of a fewer multinational companies and less control of the farmers has affected the genetic diversity as well as the farmers’ rights. Farmers have little scope to participate in the seed policy regime even if South Asia is a region with high plant diversity. There is an increase in seeds imported by South Asian countries, especially hybrid seeds which threaten the seed diversity and the seed sovereignty.
Seed sovereignty is a natural driver of local seed development and the development and maintenance of seed diversity. There are existing initiatives of farmers groups and organizations in meeting farmers’ demands for quality, affordable, accessible and resilient seeds through community seed banks, seed producer cooperatives and partnerships with seed companies. There are also research institutions, particularly the NARS who partner with farmers organizations in the production and distribution of quality seeds. Some governments have policies that help promoting seed sovereignty and access to quality and affordable seeds and the self-determination of a farmer to save, select and share seeds.
The SAARC
The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is the regional intergovernmental organization and geo political union of nations in South Asia. It was founded in Dhaka in 1985. Its secretariat is based in Kathmandu, Nepal. Its SAARC Agricultural Center is based in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Part of its official declaration during the 2014 summit reads:
“The Heads of State or Government agreed to increase investment, promote research and development, facilitate technical cooperation and apply innovative, appropriate and reliable technologies in the agriculture sector for enhancing productivity to ensure food and nutritional security in the region. They also underscored the importance of promoting sustainable agriculture. The Leaders directed to eliminate the threshold criteria from the SAARC Food Bank Agreement so as to enable the Member States to avail food grains, during both emergency and normal time food difficulty. The Leaders urged for early ratification of the SAARC Seed Bank Agreement and directed to constitute the Seed Bank Board, pending completion of ratification by all Member States. The Leaders also directed the relevant SAARC bodies to finalize the establishment of Regional Vaccine Bank and Regional Livestock Gene Bank.
The Leaders reiterated their strong commitment to free South Asia from poverty and directed the Ministerial and Secretary-level mechanisms on poverty alleviation to review the progress and revisit the SAARC Plan of Action and its effective implementation, also taking into account the Post-2015 Development Agenda. They recognized the potential of cooperatives in achieving inclusive, broad-based and sustainable economic growth and development, and called for sharing of experiences, expertise and best practices in this sector.”
CSO/FO Initiatives
Civil society groups in South Asia have taken initiatives to promote seed sovereignty and community seed banking in South Asia. Linking with that, farmers organizations, working together under the platforms catalysed by the project MTCP2 (Medium Term Cooperation Program Phase 2), supported by IFAD, SDC and EU, and managed by a consortium of AFA and LVC, with AFA as Grant Recipient, have initiated efforts to both respond to the issues of the farmers sector in South Asia, including on sustainable agriculture, fisheries and forestry. Through the MTCP2 project, FOs, are promoting integrated, diversified, organic farming and sustainable forestry/agro forestry and on establishing community seed banks among their local /sub national.
Partners
The collaborators or partners of the learning exchange programme are:
SAARC Agricultural Centre (SAC) is the first regional Centre established by the SAARC. The Centre started functioning in 1988 with a mandate for information management, primarily in the field of agriculture and allied discipline. With the passage of time, the Centre braced up broader challenges to make regional cooperation more responsive to the needs of the stakeholders and farming communities as South Asia heads for a new order of agricultural transformation. The SAARC Agriculture Centre thus has been given an enhanced mandate for agricultural research and development, policy planning, and knowledge management.
The Asian Farmers Association (AFA) established in 2002 is an alliance of national farmers’ organizations currently with 20 member organizations in 16 countries in Southeast, East, South and Central Asia with a combined membership of around 13 million small scale women and men farmers, fishers and indigenous peoples. AFA, in consortium with another peasant organization, La Via Campesina, is managing a USD 10 million valued five-year capacity building program for FOs called MTCP2 (Medium Term Cooperation Program Phase 2) supported by IFAD, SDC and EU. The program is being implemented in 20 countries in 3 sub regions of Asia: southeast, south and pacific. In South Asia, the MTCP2 is being implemented in 4 countries (Nepal, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka) by 48 national FOs and 450 sub national FOs
ActionAid (AA) is an international organization present in more than 40 countries in Africa, Asia, America and Europe. ActionAid has been developing various activities on sustainable agriculture with its partners – all of which have been influenced by several schools of thought from organic agriculture, agro-ecology, conservation agriculture, permaculture and conventional agriculture. ActionAid through its Human Rights Based Approach (HRBA) has included sustainable agriculture or agroecology as one of the integral components of its goal to ensure that poor people have sovereignty over their food and production systems.
OBJECTIVES
The aims of the exposure visit to share and learn from the experiences of various farmers’ organizations and government agricultural officers in promoting policies and programs for achieving seed sovereignty for resilient agriculture.
Specific objectives will include:
- Sharing: Share their initiatives, challenges and lessons learned in promoting sustainable seed management and seed sovereignty
- Capturing lessons learned:
- Identify technologies on sustainable seed management and draw out some guidelines on appropriate use of these technologies
- Identify key factors of success, key tips and guidelines in promoting the technologies for sustainable seed management and seed sovereignty
- Application of learning:
- Outline key action points that each Farmer Organizations and Agriculture Institutions (both at national and regional levels) will do in future to improve a particular aspect or facet in promoting seed sovereignty (e.g. better ways for community seed banking, seed producer cooperatives, partnership between Farmer Organization and research institutions, joint advocacy for a national seed policy)
- Provide recommendations for the relevant operationalization of SAARC Seed Bank and SAARC Seed Board
EXPECTED OUTPUTS
- Case studies on experiences on sustainable seed management and seed sovereignty
- Some indicators on what is a sustainable seed management and some guide on how to strengthen seed network among and between the countries
- Action plan from each national farmer organization/platform and Agriculture institutions for next 1 year describing how they will apply their learning
- Policy Recommendations at regional level to promote seed sovereignty
METHODOLOGY
Exchange visit, brief presentations, case study sharing, brain storming
National focal point expert nominated by each member country will prepare a brief report (5-10 pages) on “community based seed production, saving and exchange systems” in respective countries including history of seed saving, different seed saving communities and their institutional arrangements, seed saving methods, seed production and processing techniques, seed saving techniques, seed quality testing and seed exchange methods, governmental support for community seed saving programs, provisions in government seed acts and regulations for community engagements in seed systems, challenges and issues, success stories of community seed saving, suggestions and recommendations for improvement of community seed production, saving and exchange.
PARTICIPANTS
About 45-50 participants including 2 farmer representatives from each SAARC country (nominations will be received through AFA), 1 government extension officer from each SAARC countries (nominations will be received through SAARC Secretariat), 4 representatives from AFA-LVC, 4 representatives from SAC, 2 representatives from AAI, 3 representatives from RDA, 5 experts on seed sovereignty (SAARC member states), 2 Seed policy experts, representatives from development partners
Extension officer (Government employees) who are eligible to be nominated by SAARC member countries as well as farmer representatives to be nominated by MTCP2 FO partners should have practical experience in development of community based seed production and seed saving programs. Further, they must also have a considerable knowledge in national seed laws and seed acts.
PROGRAM SCHEDULE
| Time | Program Detail | |
| 8:45 | 9:10 | Registration |
| 9:10 | 10:30 | Opening Session:
Chair: Dr. Md. Kabir Ikramul Haque, Executive Chairman BARC (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana) Welcome Address: Dr. S.M. Bokhtiar, Director SAC Introduction of the of Participants Overview of the workshop and schedule: Ma. Esthella A. Penunia, Secretary General, AFA Remarks by Ms. Shazada Begum, Vice Chairperson, Asian Farmers Association Remarks by the special guest: Farah Kabir, Country Director, Actionaid Bangladesh Remarks by the chief guest: Mr. Ashraf Uddin Ahmed, Additional Secretary and Director General, Seed, MoA Bangladesh Address by the Chairperson: Dr. Md. Kabir Ikramul Haque, Executive Chairman BARC (Anchor by Dr. Susmita Das, Senior Documentation Officer AIC, BARC) |
| 10:40 | 11:00 | Coffee Break / Group Photo |
| 11:00
|
13:00 | Plenary Contextual Framework – Seed and the future of food security in South Asia:
Chair: Mr. Anwar Faruque, Ex Secretary MoA, Bangladesh (Reporter: Ms. Sohana Sultana) 1. The Seed System in South Asia: Situation, Policies and Programs, Challenges: Dr. Pradyuma Raj Pandey, SAC, Bangladesh 2. The Seed Situation at the Global Level: Mr. Md. Shahjanhan Ali, Seed Technologist and Seed Regulation Specialist, Bangladesh 3. The ITPGFRA and Farmers Rights: Thomas Price, GFAR, Italy (through Skype) 4. CSO Initiatives in Promoting Seed Sovereignty in South Asia: Dr. Keshab Khadka, Senior Technical Adviser, MTCP2 South Asia, Nepal (Each presentation 15 mins/ Open discussion from the participants 30 mins) |
| 13.00 | 14.00 | Lunch Break |
| 14:00 | 20:00 | Travel from Dhaka to RDA by Air (Iftar on the way to RDA, Bogura) |
| 20.00 | 21.30 | Check in and welcome dinner at RDA, Bogura |
| Day 2, May 20, Sunday | |||
| 08.30 | 08:45 | Morning Energizers, Introduction of the Day’s session | Dr. Wickey |
| 8:45 | 11:30 | Chair: Mr. MA Motin, DG- RDA, (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana)
Presentation on Country prospect of community seed situation (national focal point from Member states and FOs ) (Each country presentation (GO & FO) 20 Mins and 5 Mins open discussion for each country ) Tea and Coffee will be serve during the session |
|
| 11:30 | 12:30 | Group work: Facilitating by Sheik Dastagir Shameem – Coordinator Women Rights AAI (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana)
Country –level discussions for identifying the successful factors, lessons learned and application of the lessons learned from the presentation Considering the seed situation/government initiatives/policy and laws for community seed management of country prospective by FO and focal point experts and presentation |
Mr. Amir |
| 12.30 | 13.00 | Outcome of the group work by the facilitator with the support of rapporteur | |
| 13.00 | 14.00 | Lunch Break | |
| 14.00 | 14:30 | Presentation on Community initiatives (Maria Model) by Dr. AKM Zakaria Ex Director Training, RDA, Bogura | Mr. Helal |
| 14:30 | 17:30 | Field visit including travel (to familiarise Planning, production, processing, preservation, exchange systems, type and variety of seed, support received from government service providers, transportation and storage
Production and distribution system, relationship with different stakeholders, marketing system, profit margin and sustainability of seed production by the farmers Brief overview of the field visit by Dr. AKM Zakaria and Dr. Susmita Das |
|
| 19:30 | 22:00 | Cultural program and Solidarity Dinner | |
| Day 3, May 21, Monday | |||
| Time | Program | Person-in-charge | |
| 09.00 | 10.30 | Ways Forward Facilitator: Ma. Esthella A. Penunia (Rapporteur: Ms. Sohana Sultana)
Brainstorming on the key lesson learned and identify way forward and planning of individual member countries and regional partners |
Dr. Wickey |
| 10.30 | 11.00 | Tea and Coffee | |
| 11.00 | 12.00 | Closing Ceremony Chair: Mr. MA Matin
Synthesis of 3 day discussion, field visit learning and recommendations drawn: Ma. Esthella A. Penunia, Ms. Sohana Sultana Speech from guest of honour (15 mins each) Certificate distribution Closing speech form the chair |
Dr. Pandey |
| 12.00 | 12.45 | Lunch Break | Mr. Helal and Mr. Amir |
| 13:00 | Check out RDA, Travel from RDA to Dhaka by Air and recheck in KIB(Dhaka, Bangladesh) | ||
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