EU & Asian Activists Organize for
Re-Localization of Global Food System

Moving the anti-globalization movement "from opposition to proposition"
By Colin Hines

from Resurgence issue 210
http://www.gn.apc.org/resurgence/issues/hines210.htm

I WAS SITTING next to an environmentalist friend with whom
I have worked over the decades, at yet another huge public meeting
on globalization. The eloquent speakers were piling one horror story
upon another to an audience who had come because they already
knew too well the adverse effects of the process. When a break was
announced, my neighbour turned to me and said despairingly: "Thank
goodness now I can go to the loo and slit my veins! Why do they do
this to us; why don't we ever hear detailed answers and solutions
to discuss?"

Thus was born the idea behind a day in July last year given over to
'Local Food - Global Solutions'.

Its purpose was threefold. Firstly, to recognize that food is the one
issue that can really bring home to a wide range of people what is wrong
with globalization. Secondly, to link the myriad examples of what people
are doing on the ground to take back control of the food economy from
big business with the overarching national and international policies needed
to turn these isolated examples into the norm. Thirdly, to come up with
practical campaign ideas for what to do next and to pass such
information, analysis and ideas on to all such future meetings.

This approach was felt crucial to ensure that the movement as a whole
shifts its stance from opposition to proposition. To stop merely detailing
the horror stories, with a few end-of-the-tunnel solutions thrown in, almost
as an afterthought. Instead, to help build the wider movement's involvement
through a set of policies that could actually bring about radical change
in direction of the global economy.

The first part of the Local Food - Global Solutions event brought together
around sixty people from the UK and Europe who had experience of working
on UK food issues, European food policy and the World Trade Organization
(WTO). They split into three seminars to attempt to put forward positive
solutions based on local food systems. The participants were asked to propose
how to change the direction of British agriculture post-foot-and-mouth, and to
shift the goal of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and the WTO's
Agreement on Agriculture away from agribusiness's agenda, towards the
encouragement and protection of smaller-scale, sustainable production
for more local consumption.

IN THE UK GROUP it was recognized that the foot-and-mouth debacle
is resulting in the potential for a radical rethink of UK agriculture away
from the present emphasis on increasingly intensive and export-orientated
production. There is a rising call for more local, less-intensive food
production and the rebuilding of rural economies. However, the
participants recognized that a post-foot-and-mouth agenda could be
hijacked by more status quo interests. They will want to use it as an excuse
to speed up the buy-out of small farmers and continue to call for the inevitability
of the need for more 'efficient' agriculture. Some limited funds will be proposed
for environmental upkeep in rural areas and enough aid for a niche market
organic sector to keep the supermarket shelves stocked.

Michael Hart, a farmer from the Small and Family Farmers' Alliance, pointed
out that, although farmers' markets and box schemes were welcome ways to
link some farmers with local consumers, much more fundamental changes
were needed to protect small and family farmers to ensure that they could
make a living.

The answer for him was similar to that debated in the European group. It
consisted of paying proportionately high prices for the level of production
feasible for a small farmer to survive, and then progressively less for
larger farmers. The latter always claim they are "efficient and competitive",
so presumably they could cope with a shift of subsidies from the large to
the small. Similarly the grants etc. for farming more environmentally should
be in favour of the small farmer.

Indeed, such ideas are now reaching centre-stage in Europe, with the Green
German Minister of consumer protection, food and agriculture, Renate
Künast, warning that large farms will in future have to compete in the market
without any European Union (EU) subsidies. Organic farms and small
family farms will qualify for support. Künast has also made clear that the
bigger the organic sector the less money need be spent on cleaning up pollution
and soil problems created by large-scale conventional farms.

David Baldock of the Institute for European Environmental Policy stated
that the current CAP is taking Europe gradually towards US-style regional
specialization, geared to economies of scale for 'cheap' food and exports.
This of course is the very opposite of local diversity. However, until such
time as a very different goal is achieved for the CAP there were existing
EU policy levers that could help local production within the present policy
framework, but which weren't at present being adequately taken up. For
example, the policy of 'modulation' ensures the legal ability of member
states to transfer up to 20% of the money at present spent on production
subsidies towards environmental and other grants that can be more
locally targeted and controlled. The French use this system to favour small
farmers very much along the lines suggested by Michael Hart above, i.e. the
first slice of the subsidy is not reduced for small farmers. The proceeds and
additional national money can be spent on the present Rural Development
Plans, which channels some money into local organic farms, rather than
traditional larger entities.

Britain and the rest of the EU countries could therefore be pressurized to
move further along the French path of favouring small farmers, but with an
additional financial transfer to fund the building-up of local food
infrastructure, such as local producer co-operatives.

There was also general agreement about the need to prop up small
producers via local markets as soon as possible. One answer was the
fact that there is currently a great opportunity to develop local sustainable
food through schools and other public sector catering such as hospitals
and care homes.

Of course, there are significant cultural and infrastructure barriers,
and it was recognized that addressing these in an integrated way requires
a partnership between different organizations with complementary roles.
In schools, it is important to look at sustainable food in the curriculum
(including growing food in schools' gardens) and sourcing healthy local
food for school meals.

Sustain and The Foundation for Local Food Initiatives are working
together to develop a broad campaign on this issue. The aim is to build
on the work of organizations individually and on experience from elsewhere
(e.g. in France and Italy on school meals). To give an idea of the significance
of such a shift for UK farmers, it has been estimated that if government
plans to ensure fruit consumption in schools used domestic produce, then
that could provide a market for a staggering 40% of UK fruit production.

THE DAY ENDED with an evening public meeting that packed out the Conway
Hall venue. It put forward many of the overarching policy changes that could
ensure that local food became the norm, rather than the position today
where it merely provides a few notable exceptions. As author of Localisation -
A Global Manifesto, I kicked the evening off by asserting that none of the
range of campaigns aimed at winning really significant improvements,
from food to development, from environment to pensions and from schooling to
health, had a chance of succeeding under the new theology of globalization.

To overcome this, a new goal for world trade and food production was
required - to protect the local, globally. To achieve this would require
an interconnected and self-reinforcing set of policies. These include
reintroducing tariffs and quotas to protect the local economy, a 'site
here to sell here' policy to overcome the threat of corporate relocation, a
grounding of money within the region where it is generated, gradual
introduction of resource taxes to adequately protect the environment and
pay for this very radical transition, and, finally, an internationalist set
of aid and trade rules that contributed to 'localization'.

Caroline Lucas, the Green MEP, looked at 'localization' from a European
perspective, not surprisingly since this was the election platform on
which she was voted to the European Parliament. She made clear that what she
calls "the central curse of the CAP" is never ever discussed, much less
addressed - the curse of enforced global competitiveness. Having spoken
to many farmers in the past months, the message she was getting from them
was clear. They perceive that they are being asked to perform two mutually
exclusive tasks simultaneously: to achieve ever greater levels of
international competitiveness, i.e. to be even meaner, leaner, competition
against international costs; but at precisely the same time, to achieve
higher standards of social, environmental and animal welfare. This
simply isn't possible.

Not only is this the model of agriculture in the existing EU; it's also the
model being promoted in the countries of Eastern Europe seeking to join
the EU - often with disastrous results. Take Poland. When Polish farmers
are pitted in ruthless competition against the more 'efficient' existing EU
member states, it is likely that Poland will lose up to two million
agricultural livelihoods.

Lucas was adamant that present proposals for greening the cap won't be
enough, unless combined with policies which specifically reject the need
to ruthlessly compete on price in international markets. As more consumers,
farmers and workers are experiencing the downsides of such
globalization, now is the time to consider how this can be replaced with
'localization'. Dramatically reducing world food trade and re-localizing
production must be central to the debate about transforming the CAP -
indeed, fundamentally re-nationalizing agricultural policy, decentralizing it
within nations, and only dealing with transboundary issues at the European
Union level is the key.

Lucas insisted that the CAP must be replaced by a Localist Rural and
Food Policy. Its goal would be to keep production much closer to the point
of consumption and to help protect and rebuild local economies around the
world. Its measures include the introduction of eco-taxation to ensure
that the real costs of environmental damage, unsustainable production methods
and long-distance trade are included in the costs. It would also promote the
production of healthy foodstuffs by providing assistance for change-over
costs and marketing to ensure that intensive systems are replaced by
more benign ones, such as organic farming.

To allow this to happen, over time import controls would need to be
gradually re-introduced to protect those goods which can be produced
domestically from imports which could otherwise threaten such a
rediversification of national agricultural systems. This new policy
would also end the long-distance transport and live export of animals,
restrict the concentration and market power of the major food retailers
through new competition laws, and encourage rural regeneration and
employment.

THE LABOUR MP for Nottingham South, Alan Simpson, described how last
year he had put down a Food Poverty Eradication Bill in the House of Commons.
It proposed placing a duty on government to eradicate food poverty within
fifteen years.

He also proposed a Producer Liability Bill. It would cover genetically modified
(GM) crops, but also encourage consideration of the implications for agribusiness
of things like pesticides, herbicides and growth hormones. Simpson asserted that
what has to be said is that "If your science is so good - if you're so convinced
of its virtues without consequences, then you have to take out comprehensive
public liability insurance." The industry knows that would kill off the GM crop
agenda. They know that not only is their product unsellable, it's also uninsurable.
Even NFU Mutual - the main insurer for farmers - is telling the farmers it won't
insure them if they grow GM crops.

Alan Simpson called for local authorities to set up their own local food
commission. Local authorities could exercise their democratic mandate by
negotiating for safe food contracts and accountable food suppliers.

A jocular instance of what such a future could entail was recounted by
Simpson when he described how he was having a joke with a farmer who was
a stall-holder at a farmers' market. He thought he would catch the farmer
out and said, "Of course, you can't tell me the sell-by date. There's no
bar-code." The farmer replied, "No, but would the dug-by date help?
Because they were in my field yesterday afternoon. I brought them in this
morning and they'll probably be on your plate this evening. Is that all right
for you?"

TIM LANG, Professor of Food Policy, stated that the food movement has
come a long way. Years ago when he worked with the Food Commission,
they were called Red Ken's food terrorists, and the Food Leninists. Lang,
being a vegetarian, was able to reply, "No, we're Lentilists, thank you very
much!" However, he felt that we are witnessing public policy failure. A new
policy framework is required which will take an integrated overview of the
whole food system; organize reform in collaboration with our European
partners; focus on food and environmental quality, not just on price and
quantity; rebuild local and regional food supplies to cut 'food miles'; promote
and protect ecological and public health; prioritize biodiversity throughout
the food supply chain; ensure a healthy diet is available to, and affordable
by, all, and oblige firms in the food chain to internalize as many as
possible of the costs that are currently externalized onto the public purse,
consumers and innocent third parties.

To achieve this, food prices should reflect the full costs of production.
Food miles are a key indicator to improve on, partly as thi s is a matter
of consumer consciousness and partly because food miles are a 'short-hand'
for energy use. A larger portion of the value generated in the food chain
should accrue to the farmers who grow the primary products. Shortening the
supply chain would help. Either the break-up of the big retail chains is needed
or tight regulation of competition amongst them, or both. Supporting small
farmers and curbing the power of supermarkets could thus lessen any
price rises for the poor.

The Food Standards Agency is safety-focussed, which in Lang's view is
too narrow a remit. Instead he proposes a new National Food Policy Council
that should be required to integrate competing demands of environment, safety
and health with a sustainable rural economy. Lang felt that 'food poverty'
is the running sore of the current food system. 10-15% of UK citizens
cannot afford to eat an adequate diet. Key ways forward include raising the
minimum wage and improved access to shops. Diversity of shops is just as
important as diversity of crops.

The final speaker was the Indian activist and academic, Vandana Shiva.
As usual she gave an inspiring, impassioned speech, which asserted that
opening food markets to exports was not the answer to rural poverty, but one
of its causes. She explained that the new threats to food security faced by the
poor in India, and especially food producers, come from four sources
that erode food entitlements. These are: the decline in food production, as
acreage to cash crops such as cotton and sugar cane has increased; the
dumping of imported products from both rich and poor countries, made
worse by the removal of import restrictions; the increasing cost of inputs,
particularly due to price deregulation, and falling farm prices caused
by the withdrawal of government procurement.

Of course, all these examples of reducing food security are worsened by
the insistence of the WTO on ever lower protective barriers. Mr Prakash
Singh Badal, the Chief Minister of the most prosperous state in the so-called
breadbasket of India - Punjab, warned in December 2000 that "the
implementation of the WTO Agreement (aimed at further trade
liberalization in agriculture) in the present form would lead to bloodshed in the
country." For Mr Badal "signing of the WTO Agreement amounts to signing
the death warrant for the farm sector."

Vandana Shiva was clear that the alternative that needed to be proposed
at the WTO's next governmental meeting [in Qatar last November] should
involve policy commitments, globally and nationally to protect the small farmer,
reduce costs of cultivation, reduce environmental destruction, reduce
need to purchase external inputs such as seeds and chemicals, localize
production of staples, focus on food first rather than export first policies, and
focus on high-value exports based on fair trade and environmental protection.

Shiva concluded by listing some key policy goals required for world food
trade to foster food security and localization. These included fair
trade rather than free trade; maintenance of import controls, i.e. qualitative
restrictions; no imports except to meet genuine scarcity and no imports
allowed where prices are below the cost of production in India, or in
the country of origin, to prevent dumping and the destruction of
livelihoods; no export subsidies either hidden or overt; trade monopolies
prevented; procurement only by government-controlled entities; and fair
prices to farmers and consumers rather than low prices to farmers and high
prices to consumers.

Vandana Shiva finished off her speech with a global demand that imports
be controlled by governments and that exports should only consist of
genuine surplus leftovers after food security needs have been met at all levels
by domestic production. "Let the world food trade deal in the leftovers!"

Full details of 'Local Food -Global Solutions' can be seen at
www.go-local.org. For Sustain go to www.sustainweb.org and for The
Foundation for Local Food Initiatives see www.localfood.org.uk.

Colin Hines is the author of Localization - A Global Manifesto
(Earthscan). from Resurgence issue 210Subscribe to Resurgence-
Chris Keene, Coordinator, Anti-Globalisation Network
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