Farmers' Rights Movement and the Convention on Biological Diversity

Farmers' Rights as a political concept emerged for the first time in the early 1980's to highlight the unremunerated innovations of farmers which were the basis of all modern plant breeding. The developed nations want to monopolise plant genetic resources. While the less - developed nations despite having more plant genetic diversity at their disposal, favour keeping plant resources in the public domain, preferring protection for traditional knowledge and farmers rights over monopoly rights for private interests. The Convention on Biological Diversity has been one of the responses of the world community to conserve the ecological basis of biological production through biodiversity conservation. It encourages countries to develop their own policies and programmes to conserve and sustain the resources within their own borders. The Convention on Biological Diversity makes provisions for the protection of farmers' rights and national rights to biodiversity. It encourages bilateral contracts between member states, where governments or corporations exploiting biological resources should provide compensation for the exploited resource and share benefits which arise from developing the resource.