•  salvador, brazil
• Monday, November 14, 2011
• Inter Press Service

Representatives of the Brazilian federal and municipal governments and of indigenous, black and riverbank communities and other groups that make the population of this country so diverse assumed a commitment to fight for 'the human right to an adequate diet.'

The declaration approved at the end of the Nov. 7-10 Fourth National Conference on Food and Nutrition Security, held in Salvador, the capital of the northeastern state of Bahia, states that ethnic and traditional communities must be given access to land to farm through the government's agrarian reform programme, and to the natural resources on their territories.

The meeting, which drew 2,000 delegates, including some 400 guests from other nations, discussed Brazil's successes and pending challenges in the field of food security.

The conference's conclusions are directed towards different audiences, according to Renato Maluf, president of the National Council for Food and Nutrition Security (CONSEA), made up of representatives of government and civil society.

The targets of the message include 'those involved in social mobilisations, the government at all three levels — federal, provincial and municipal — and even those who know nothing at all about the right to food…We are also addressing the world at large,' Maluf said at the closing of the conference.

The declaration states that the planet's seven billion people have 'a right to an adequate and healthy diet every day, and to protection against hunger and other forms of food and nutritional insecurity.'

It also calls for a strengthening of the agencies involved in that struggle, like the United Nations and the Committee on World Food Security (CFS).

Brazil's Ministry of Social Development and Fight Against Hunger, which presented the declaration in conjunction with CONSEA, said through spokespersons that the behaviour of corporations, monoculture farming with the intensive use of pesticides and fertilisers, and the use of transgenic crops 'have obvious effects' in terms of the loss of food sovereignty and contribute to obesity and other chronic health problems.

'It is indispensable to come up with policies that gradually reduce the use of agro-toxins and immediately eliminate the use of the ones that have already been banned in other countries, which pose a serious threat to human health and the environment,' the Ministry added.

Brazil is considered the world leader in pesticide use: Brazilians consume an average of 5.2 litres of agrochemicals each per year, according to reports presented at this week's conference.

The declaration also highlights the strategic role of family agriculture in achieving food security, along with the sustainable use of natural resources. In addition, it identifies food security and sovereignty as a cornerstone of socioeconomic development.

© Inter Press Service (2011) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service

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