Draft Communique calls for adoption of unfair amendments to Seed Treaty

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Kuala Lumpur, 24 October (TWN) – A high level draft communique for the upcoming meeting of the Governing Body of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA) calls for unfair amendments to the Treaty.

The High-Level Segment attended by Ministers of Agriculture and other high level representatives, is part of the 11th meeting of the Governing Body (GB11) of the ITPGFRA that will take place on 24 – 29 November 2025 in Lima, Peru. Regional meetings of the Treaty Parties will take place in the lead up.

Under the draft package of measures to enhance the Multilateral System (MLS) of Access and Benefit Sharing of the ITPGRFA, commonly known as the Seed Treaty, there is a proposal to amend Annex 1 of the Treaty which deals with the scope of plants covered under the MLS.

The proposal to amend is unequivocally unfair as it undermines the sovereign rights of the Contracting Parties (States) over their plant genetic materials and at the same time, fails to put in effective measures that would reduce biopiracy and increase fair and equitable benefit sharing from the use of those resources.

The Draft Communique is proposed to be adopted at the GB11 High-Level Segment. A version dated 25 September 2025, prepared by the Treaty Secretariat, reads:

“The Ministers and high-level representatives of the Contracting Parties to the ITPGRFA, gathered in Lima, Peru, for the High-Level Segment of the GB11… (3) welcome the ongoing negotiations for the enhancement of the MLS and underscore the necessity of reaching an ambitious and effective agreement at the Eleventh Session that ensures fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the utilization of PGRFA while improving access to plant genetic resources that are essential for food security and agricultural innovation, in full respect of the sovereign rights of the Contracting Parties over their PGRFA”.

Further the ‘calls to action’ section of the Draft Communique requires Contracting Parties and stakeholders to “intensify efforts to finalize the negotiations for the enhancement of the MLS within the agreed timeline, ensuring a realistic, balanced and forward-looking outcome”.

According to Resolution 3/2022 the agreed timeline is GB11 and accordingly the call is to intensify negotiations with a view to finalize a draft package of measures for the enhancement of the MLS at GB11 itself in November.

The draft package of measures forwarded by the Ad Hoc Open Ended Working Group to Enhance the Multilateral System of Access and Benefit Sharing System to the GB11 contains several proposals (mostly within brackets indicating no consensus) and a few alternatives (again within brackets). Both proposals and alternatives do not provide much hope to developing countries, as they are highly imbalanced against their interests.

Of most concern is the proposal to amend the Treaty’s Annex 1 to expand the coverage of an unaccountable and non-transparent MLS from the current 64 crops to all plants that have a potential value for food and agriculture research, inconsistent with Treaty’s own Preamble and Article 11.1.

[The Preamble of the Treaty states that the MLS is a negotiated selection of PGRFA, while Article 11.1 states that the coverage of the MLS is for PGRFA listed in Annex 1 based on their importance for food security and interdependence levels between States to maintain access to genetic diversity of such resources. A full expansion as proposed negates this notion of negotiated selection.]

The package currently contains about 200 square brackets, indicating a high level of dissonance among the members of the Working Group that forwarded the draft.

A developing country delegate told Third World Network that no amount of negotiations during the 5 days of the Governing Body can resolve the contentious issues currently in the draft package. “The problems in the operations of the MLS are so complex and the very fundamentals of the Treaty are in question. Hence there is nothing to be surprised if a “take it or leave it” package pops up during the GB, mostly written by a handful of negotiators and our ministers would be put under pressure,” said the delegate.

“We need more time to ensure the enhancement process leads to a transformative change in the MLS. The current measures on the table are inadequate to bring any good change in the MLS,” according to another developing country delegate.

Some of the important concerns on the amendment package are listed below.

Expansion of Plant Genetic Resources covered under the MLS

Under the MLS Contracting Parties are to share with each other the seeds or other plant genetic materials belonging to the agreed selected 64 crops by signing a standard material transfer agreement (SMTA), in exchange for the promise of benefit sharing. The promised benefits include monetary contributions for sales of seeds developed using the MLS and non-monetary benefits like information on the research results. However, to date only 6 out of 28,000 plus users have shared any monetary benefits with the ITPGRFA Secretariat.

The current amendment proposal is to expand from 64 crops to all plant genetic resources for food and agriculture (PGRFA), in particular those under the management and control of the Contracting Parties in ex situ collections and in the public domain, i.e. PGRFA collections under government agencies, and not held in trust for any farmers and other individuals. An amendment to Annex 1 of the Treaty is proposed under the package of measures. In addition, the package in its draft resolution paragraph 39 also encourages Parties to share seeds from in situ conditions, also through the very same SMTA, especially when they do not have national legislation that are applicable.  This paragraph read with Article 12.3.h of the Seed Treaty could also bring PGRFA under in situ conditions into the coverage of the MLS.

PGRFA is defined in the Treaty as “any genetic material of plant origin of actual or potential value for food and agriculture”. This means genetic materials from any plant, even that of non-edible plants, can be considered as PGRFA provided someone claims a potential value for food and agricultural research. Thus, with the proposal to amend the Treaty, Contracting Parties are required to share most of their plant genetic resources, if not all (under certain limited exceptions), through the MLS. This makes the national ABS regimes developed on the basis of the Convention on Biological Diversity and its Nagoya Protocol redundant when it comes to plant genetic resources.

The amendment proposal contains two clauses to create exceptions to an expanded Annex 1. First, a clause that says only seeds “under the management and control of the Contracting Parties, and in public domain and in the ex situ collections” need to be shared by the Parties.

Secondly, there is a “one-time negative list” that allows Contracting Parties to exceptionally exempt a certain limited number of species from Annex 1 at the time of ratifying or accepting the proposed amendment. These clauses are foxes in sheep’s skin. Rather than act as safety clauses they bring all national collections of seeds within the scope of the MLS, upon the entry into force of the amendment.

As mentioned earlier, draft resolution paragraph 39 and Article 12.3.h of the Treaty can trump the first safety clause. Words like “under the management and control of Parties and public domain” are not defined and are all susceptible to interpretation. A one-time negative list is a very difficult provision to use, especially for developing countries who are rich in agro-biodiversity. Such a list is also adverse to a Party’s sovereign authority to determine access to its genetic resources as recognized under the CBD and its Nagoya Protocol and operationalized through national legislation.

Furthermore, a recent study of the CGIAR centres concluded that the use of the MLS even for breeding is not detectable. Thus, once a seed is shared through the MLS, its use and misuse are not being monitored or regulated, which not only undermines benefit sharing under the Treaty, but also promotes bio-piracy. While on one hand Parties lose control over their resources (seeds) shared under the MLS, most of the products coming out from the undetectable use or misuse of these resources are monopolized under intellectual property claims (patent or plant variety protection laws) by the commercial sector. This fundamentally weakens food and seed sovereignty and consequently food security.

One might argue that the PGRFA are shared only for limited breeding purposes. However, the Treaty and SMTA purpose clause is ambiguous and susceptible to interpretations whereby food and feed industries can use PGRFA for purposes beyond breeding. Yet at present they are not required to share any monetary benefits. Although the Treaty requires Contracting Parties to develop strategies to make food processing industries share monetary benefits under Article 13.6, this provision is not implemented and neither does the package of measures seek to operationalize the same.

Non-transparent and Unaccountable operations

The MLS allows onward sharing of seeds by the recipients to third parties, on a condition that an SMTA will be signed by the recipient and third party and the same will be reported to the Governing Body through the Secretariat. However, the Secretariat that has received more than a hundred thousand SMTAs from 28,000 plus users have not reported to the GB about who are the recipients of the seeds and what seeds they have accessed.

More importantly, seeds from developing country regions such as Asia, Africa and Latin America are transacted by the international gene banks rather than their own national authorities. For instance, all African Parties have signed 83 agreements, while international gene banks signed more 16,000 agreements on African seeds. The case is opposite when it comes to seeds from developed country regions like North America and Europe.

Thus, the MLS with seeds being transacted by international agencies and the Secretariat not providing information to Contracting Parties, leaves contributing farmers and national authorities from developing countries in complete ignorance about who is using the seeds they contributed.

Even worse, Article 15 institutions, like CGIAR Centres themselves, have released the genetic sequence data or digital sequence information (GSD/DSI) of seeds into online databases that can be accessed anonymously, allowing non-food and non-feed sectors to use such data without detection. Therefore, the Treaty MLS is not only ineffective internally, but also compromises national ABS systems of developing countries, as several benefits to be received by the national authorities directly outside of the Treaty are also affected by the lack of governance of the Treaty.

The package of measures does not address any of these gaps and concerns; instead, it adds three more confidentiality clauses into the SMTA, legitimizing the lack of transparency with which MLS is currently functioning. With respect to GSD/DSI, there are also no effective proposals that will establish good data governance such that digital biopiracy is prevented and benefits from the use of the PGRFA GSD/DSI is shared fairly and equitably.

Farmers and Civil Societies Call to Reject the Deal

The Treaty MLS with its lack of transparency also compromises farmers’ right to seeds, including rights such as recognition of their contribution, protection of their traditional knowledge, informed participation in benefit sharing, and decision-making related to seed policies, as well as rights to save, use, exchange and sell farm-saved seed/propagating material.

On 12 September 2025 several farmers organisations and civil society organisations have written a joint letter to the FAO Director General and ITPGRFA Secretary expressing concerns on the lack of transparency and accountability of the functioning of the MLS. More than 500 signatories to this letter have called for an outright rejection of the current package of measures and for a revamping of the process for enhancement of the MLS to mainstream Farmers’ Rights. Regarding the enhancement of the MLS the signatories called for a world-wide consultation with farmers who are the original contributors of the seeds. [Read the letter in Spanish, Hindi, and French here: https://seedtreaty.org/]

The letter also expressed concern that the Working Group failed in its mandate because Resolution 7/2023 had requested the Co-Chairs to consider the implications on Farmers’ Rights while developing measures for the enhancement of the MLS, but the Working Group did not consider the issue at all. Serious concerns regarding the meeting reports of the Working Group were also highlighted in the letter as views from the farmers organisations and civil society groups were not reflected in the meeting reports.

The FAO Office of Climate Change, Biodiversity and Environment, in a letter dated 2 October, has responded to the signatories and has informed that the Treaty Secretariat will share the joint letter, in the languages received, with the Vice-Chairs of the Bureau of the Eleventh Session of the Governing Body, who represent the different WHO Regional Groups.

Interestingly it is surprising in this context, the Draft Communique makes no reference to implications of the operations of the MLS or its enhancement on the full range of Farmers’ Rights. Instead, paragraph 4 the Draft Communique reads:

”Recognize the fundamental contributions of farmers, particularly Indigenous Peoples and local communities, in the conservation, sustainable use, and exchange of PGRFA, and commit to further strengthening the flow of benefits to farmers and safeguarding their rights, particularly for women farmers and other groups with untapped economic potential in alignment with the objectives of the Treaty”.

On the contrary, the draft package of measures does not have any proposal to strengthen the flow of benefits to farmers. There is no proposal to improve the disbursement of money collected by the FAO fund to farmers. Nor are there proposals on accountability and governance which ensure users of the seeds would contribute money into the FAO Fund. Above all more confidentiality clauses are being added to the SMTA, legitimising current non-transparent practices of the Treaty Secretariat, allowing the users to hide from national authorities and public scrutiny.

Communique to put pressure on developing countries

A senior developing country delegate told Third World Network that the Global North and Treaty Secretariat are aware that the draft package is immature and unbalanced. No amount of negotiations during GB11 is going to generate a consensus. Hence the Ministerial segment is targeted to obtain a high-level political compromise from the Ministers of developing countries which would tie down developing country negotiators to an outcome.

A delegate explained: “Ministers will be presented with high-level head-lines contained in the package of measures within a limited time, mostly appealing to everyone and harmless. For example, paragraph 3 of the draft communique now says ‘in full respect of the sovereign rights of the Contracting Parties’, but does the package of measures really respect sovereign rights? The answer is no. They want Ministers to declare that there is a necessity for an agreement on the enhancement of the multilateral system in GB11. Then in the negotiating room, easy pressure can be put on the developing country negotiators to accept all unfair demands made by the Global North”. 

If a “take it or leave it” package appears at GB11 in November there will be no change to the current proposal to expand beyond 64 crops to “all plant generic resources for food and agriculture”.

Switzerland, which is co-host of the GB and is the Chair  of the GB, is the main proponent for expansion of the Treaty scope to all plants, with all developed countries supporting this. – Third World Network