Food for Thought: UN Agency Promotes Global Governance of Food Policies
ECONOMICS, CORPORATE CITIZENSHIP, HUMAN RIGHTS, SOCIETY & CULTURE
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
In theory, the human “right to food” is a basic one with which few individuals would take issue. In practice, however, the United Nations wants to determine and dictate to governments and businesses the obligations that they have to ensure that everyone is able to realize their “right to food.” Thus, on October 23, 2009, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) published its Methodological Toolbox on the Right to Food (the Toolbox), a five-volume set of guidelines designed to provide governments a framework for implementing right to food legislation, monitoring, and education at the national level.
The right to food has long been recognized as a basic human right, though its exact parameters are unclear. It was first given formal recognition as a human right by the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1948 when the Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Art. 25.1). Under Article 11 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (the Covenant), States Parties recognize the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including, among other things, adequate food. Pursuant to General Comment 12 of the Covenant, the “right to adequate food is realized when every man, woman and child, alone or in community with others, has the physical and economic access at all times to adequate food or means for its procurement.” Recently, in 2005, the General Assembly, at its 59th Session, adopted Resolution 59/202: The right to food, which reaffirmed the notion that the right to food is a basic human right and called upon States to implement legal and political strategies to ensure that the right to food was not compromised.
To give traction to the right to food provisions of the Covenant, General Comment 12, the Resolution, and other right-to-food related treaties and agreements, Volume 1 of the FAO Toolbox, a Guide on Legislating for the Right to Food (the Guide), provides a three-step process for how governments, under the guidance of the United Nations, can implement the right to food at the national level. According to the Guide, States must incorporate the right to food into national constitutions. Second, they must establish a “framework” law on the right to food, which sets out obligations for state authorities and private actors and establishes “necessary” institutional mechanisms to enforce right to food legislation and policies. Finally, States must initiate a comprehensive review of all laws affecting the right to food to ensure their compatibility with that right.
Citing examples for how the right to food has been incorporated into other national constitutions and interpreted by members of their judicial bodies, the Guide recommends that explicit detail be given to the right to food in constitutions to ensure its enforceability. Obviously, as suggested by the Guide, non-governmental and international organizations would then rely on these constitutional provisions to “measure the action or inaction by government actors.” No doubt, this would encourage enterprising attorneys to sue national, state, and local governments for failing to provide “adequate” food to their citizens.
The “framework” law contemplated by the Guide is that body of legislation and policies that would establish the exact legal duties arising from the right to food contained in the constitution. These laws would set forth the policies, institutions, and mechanisms for implementing and monitoring right to food legislation and provide penalties for failure to realize the right to food. Before the drafting even begins on such legislation, the Guide insists that there must be a careful examination of each State’s multiple international commitments, institutions, and legislation because “the framework law will have to be designed to reflect those international obligations.” Additionally, the Guide proposes that the drafting of the right to food legislation be done under the guidance of civil society organizations and international human rights bodies and in consultation with groups of foreign experts (such as the European Court of Human Rights and African Union) which, in the UN’s opinion, can contribute their knowledge of international human rights standards and later help monitor implementation efforts.
As further examples of the affront to national sovereignty and personal freedom, the Guide suggests that the scope of the framework law include not only the work of governmental actors, but extend to corporate activities and “impose specific duties on private persons or entities directly, barring them from hindering others’ enjoyment of the right to food.” Moreover, in a recommendation that mirrors the efforts of the United Nations’ World Programme for Human Rights Education, the Guide stresses that any framework law that is adopted must require government authorities to provide education and training on the right to food and international human rights principles through school curricula and adult education programs. Finally, the Guide states that it should be the duty of judges who are faced with right-to-food related cases to “interpret legal provisions in question with reference to [the Covenant] and other relevant international human rights instruments.”
At over 300 pages, the Guide contains an exhaustive discussion and recommendations for the creation and implementation of national right to food policies. It is unfathomable that the nations who approved the Covenant and its simple recognition of a right to adequate food could have intended that the UN and its related agencies would contemplate, propose, and provide such a detailed training manual for the development and global governance of food policy and programs at the national level.
Jim Kelly is the President of Solidarity Center for Law and Justice, P.C., a public interest civil and human rights law firm based in Atlanta, Georgia. The opinions expressed herein are his own.
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