PROCEEDINGS
Nutrition, education and awareness raising developments in the progressive realization of the right to adequate food
Collection of contributions received
Table of Contents
Introduction to the topic 3
Contributions received 5
1. Kenia Páramo, UNAN Managua, Nicaragua 5
2. Claudio Schuftan, Viet Nam 5
3. George Kent, University of Hawaii (Emeritus), United States of America 10
4. Santosh Kumar Mishra, S. N. D. T. Women’s University , India 11
5. Subhash Mehta, India 14
6. Serena Pepino, FAO - Facilitator of the discussion 14
7. Manuel Castrillo, Proyecto Camino Verde, Costa Rica 15
8. Juana Benavides, Bolivia 16
9. Manuel Castrillo, Proyecto Camino Verde, Costa Rica 16
10. O.Jeranyama, South Africa 17
11. Muhammad Ariful Haque, Kamfisht Universe Engineering, Bangladesh 17
12. Maria del Valle Rodriguez C, Universidad Nacional Experimental "Ezequiel Zamora", Venezuela 19
13. Hamid Ahmad, Pakistan Society of Food Scientists & Technologists (PSFST), Pakistan 20
14. Subhash Mehta, India 21
15. Sher Muhammad Panhwer, Farmer Agriculture Innovation Development Organization Mirpurkhas Sindh, Pakistan 22
16. Subhash Mehta, India 22
17. Subhash Mehta, India 26
18. Subhash Mehta, India 27
19. Subhash Mehta, India 27
20. Serena Pepino, FAO - Facilitator of the discussion 32
Introduction to the topic
2014 marks the 10th anniversary of the Voluntary Guidelines to support the progressive realization of the right to adequate food in the context of national food security (Right to Food Guidelines). At its 41st Session from 13-17 October 2014 the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) will undertake a retrospective of the progress made in the implementation of the Right to Food Guidelines (RtFG). FAO prepared a number of working studies on different aspects of the Right to Food Guidelines as a contribution to the retrospective, and a number of these will be discussed in the Right to Food Forum. Developments in nutrition, education and awareness raising are the subject of this second online discussion.
As a basis for this discussion, the relevant working study is available here. It explores advances and challenges related to the Right to Food Guidelines 10 and 11 and argues that:
1. the achievement of nutritional and culturally accepted well-being is an integral part of the full realization of the right to adequate food. Nutrition considerations must be included in all food system debates and measures being taken regarding the protection, fulfilment and respect of this right;
2. education and awareness raising give people needed knowledge which helps them develop skills to make good food choices, and build their confidence in claiming their rights through a broad spectrum of tools and means, including human rights and nutrition education.
The working study concludes that nutritious diets, access to education, and increased awareness on the right to food are not only instrumental, but vital to achieving people’s full physical and cognitive human development, potential and health, concepts which are interdependent, indivisible and interrelated with regard to the right to food. This discussion aims at gathering more evidence from the past 10 years on Guidelines 10 and 11. We would particularly welcome contributions around the following focus questions:
· Are there some specific country examples or stories that illustrate how a given nutrition intervention (such as in nutrition-sensitive agriculture, nutrition education, appropriate breastfeeding practices, clean water and adequate sanitation, etc.) contributed to the progressive realization of the right to food (for example by increasing knowledge and capacity of decision-makers; by helping beneficiaries making informed decision on nutrition-sensitive matters, etc.)?
· Are there some specific country examples or stories that illustrate how a particular education or awareness raising intervention (such as in human rights, nutrition, health, food safety, literacy and other skills training for sustainable development; primary, secondary and higher education; information sharing; school and university curricula) contributed to the progressive realization of the right to food (for example by supporting investment in nutrition, human rights or food security training; or broadening primary education for girls and women and other vulnerable groups; strengthening technical knowledge and education at higher level on human rights, nutrition and the right to food, etc.)?
Please join the debate on nutrition, education, awareness raising and the right to food!
I thank you in advance for your thoughts and comments!
Serena Pepino, FAO Right to Food Team (ESA)
.
Contributions received
1. Kenia Páramo, UNAN Managua, Nicaragua
Como parte del Derecho humano a la alimentacion y principalmente que sea adecuada culturalmente, Nicaragua junto con organismos internacionales contribuyen al cumplimiento de este derecho, un ejemplo es la participacion del gobierno en la merienda escolar que se le brinda a los niños y niñas de toda Nicaragua como el arroz, frijoles, maiz, aceite, azucar y el inicio de la elaboracion de huertos escolares como un medio de enseñanza aprendizaje para que los niños/as aprendan de la importancia del cultivo de las frutas y vegetales y que estas formen parte de su merienda escolar. Cada dia se unen esfuerzos por la lucha contra el hambre, es un deber de cada uno de nosotros apoyar, educar y compartir las experiencias y conocimientos basados en la Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutricional.
2. Claudio Schuftan, Viet Nam
Dear friends,
You are asking for inputs for this e-consultation.
Here are some salient points for me that I would like to contribute:
Most of my comments pertain more closely to Guideline 11.
For me, HR learning is by far the most urgent priority with the Panther Principles right in the middle.
Nothing will take off in our struggle for the RTF unless we massively engage on overall HR learning. I append two short papers on this to make clear what I mean.
The background document you have posted keeps repeating worn concepts that have lost their meaning over the years:
intersectoral/multisectoral, comprehensive approach, holistic, and worse of all, multi-stakeholder (p.17 + p.18) [How can you put out a RTF background document avoiding the use of rights holders and duty bearers?]. Are we not ourselves guilty?
We cannot continue using non-HR language....and that is why massive HR learning is necessary....even among us. The concepts listed have no place in HR talk.
You also say/imply that the SUN initiative is HR-based. Well, It isn't. (So also said the special rapporteur...).
In HR parlance, we also do not talk about targeting; we focus most of our efforts on those made most vulnerable by an unfair system.
But your document is mixed.
-It does say that with the introduction of the HRBA we are facing a question of a fundamental approach to development. (p.13).
-Asking people WHY HR are not realized can be a powerful tool (I'd say is, not can). (p.13)
-We need to sharpen the focus on people's rights and need awareness rising on HR (p.14 + p.17).
-We need to take into account the root causes of food insecurity (I'd say of the lack of food sovereignty) (p.14).
-HR education (I'd say learning) is particularly crucial and should be prioritized (I'd say must) and receives little coverage (Indeed!!) (p.14).
-The challenge is the adoption of the HRBA (p.14)
-Adopting the HRBA will strengthen nutrition by addressing the rights of populations (p.17).
Well, all these point to the unpostponable need of engaging in massive HR learning --and one of the things that need to be covered is that, at this point, it is not about strengthening governance (as you call for on p.18). The governance we have is oblivious to HR. We thus have to find ways to oppose counterpower to power if things are to change; and these are things that need to be brought up in HR learning.
In short, the HR framework will only take center stage in serving the RTF if and when the pressure is generated from below. History is witness. And for that we have a long way to go to reach the threshold for a tipping point to occur. Massive HR learning is the #1 challenge for post 2015.
Here are the short papers where I go deeper into all this.
HUMAN RIGHTS LEARNING HAS TO BE MADE INTO A YEAR-ROUND COMMUNITY RESOURCE.
We cannot continue with a popular education that is mostly reactive.
1. Popular education is a central part of the agenda of the human rights (HR) movement and must be oriented towards redefining development policies, as well as redefining the concept of social, ethical and environmental responsibility in the different sectors of our respective societies.
2. In this thrust, the biggest challenge we face may not be the introduction of new concepts and of ‘possible futures’, but actually to rise to the challenge of eradicating the old concepts and the oversold, rather ‘hopeless futures’.
3. Therefore, human rights learning (HRL) is THE challenge to address in building this new sense of community in our societies.
4. HRL has to come-in to address the so called ‘modern-age-conditions’, to place concrete demands and to foster concrete actions that confront face-on the unfair elements of this ‘condition’.
5. This, we consider carries a number of risks we have to be prepared to deal with, because such actions:
• Will require establishing new social contracts in which the respect for HR is placed at the center and in which solidarity links among organizations are set-up as-soon-as-possible as a response to the flagrant conflicts brought about by this modern-age-condition.*
*: The call here is for going beyond the increasingly popular nutrition-literacy movement and instead go into a more all-encompassing HRL movement (that does have fostering better nutrition as one of its components --but just as one among other equally important components).
• Will require developing a greater sense of social and political responsibility when addressing the inequalities of the risk society, primarily the social exclusion and the environmental deterioration it perpetuates.
• Will require embarking in a process of politicizing HRL, i.e., carrying out education in the public sphere with a political orientation.
6. In short, HRL has to become proactive when facing the challenges of the risk society. Every step of the way, we will have to clearly justify why we are going beyond ‘standard’ and intellectualized concepts, myths and academic jargon.
7. Through a moral and political learning process, we have to draw new organizational maps and new ways of ‘getting-to-know-reality’ (we see what we look for…) that can generate levels of social and political solidarity among civil society never before seen.
8. What we are talking about here is of multiplying exchange dialogues between the facilitators’ and the learners’ different realities and world visions, all through the lens of the HR framework.
9. This approach clearly leads HRL facilitators to act as mobilizers of marginalized social groups so the latter begin proactively opposing exclusion, discrimination and the violation of their inalienable HR.
10. By getting on with such actions the goal is to enable people to start working together to demand the un-postponable needed structural changes are made. HRL is thus to become the expression of a public morality based on HR. To get there, HRL has to build confidence in people so as to mobilize them while still respecting diversity.
11. Do not get this wrong now: HRL is to be a process in which individuals and groups of people get involved voluntarily as HRL is ultimately geared towards potentiating their social capabilities, those that allow them to become competent, autonomous, independent, and good managers of their own development.
12. All this requires HRL to bring-in and instill a good dose of reasoning and of argumentation-to-explain-and make-sense of what, in times past, has been taken as a given or a fait-accompli. This is what, in our experience, HRL does best; and this is the new educational pragmatism we have to adopt, i.e., a pragmatism that adheres to solidarity movements, that strengthens praxis, that goes back to ask about the sense of ‘what-is-considered-to-be-common’, and that asks about what HR-as-a-universal-value is all about.
13. No doubt, what we have in front of us is the daunting task of working towards making these HRL processes flourish and grow, as well as the no less challenging task to analyze the practical experiences that are already slowly opening new inroads in popular education. For that, we have to multiply our efforts and do much more work for and through HRL groups the world over. These groups have to impart an education that responds to the ubiquitous HR violations and challenges using totally new learning contents and methods, as well as opening new HR learning opportunities and venues.
14. In endless contexts worldwide, it is no longer conceivable not to speak publicly and politically about HR, about democracy, about dignity, and about marginalization. So we cannot leave these discussions aside; we absolutely have to address these issues openly. HRL is the vehicle.
15. In sum, we can say that all this is about global action for a new popular democracy.
16. The take-home message from all of this is that HRL is here to combat ambiguity and procrastination, because both are conducive either to non-action: “no matter what I do, it is wrong or will not change things”-- or conducive to too little action based on a faulty interpretation of reality that is biased towards an unacceptable status-quo: “not doing anything is alright; it will all sort itself out --eventually”. We forcefully contest and fight against these attitudes!
17. And remember: At the end of the day, we should be teaching for human rights, not teaching about human rights!
Claudio Schuftan, Ho Chi Minh City
xxxxx
TRADITIONAL CAPACITY BUILDING IN CURRENT DEVELOPMENT SCHEMES BOILS DOWN TO REITERATING A CERTAIN LOGIC OF THINKING THAT SERVES THE HEGEMONIC AIMS OF THE PREVAILING DEVELOPMENT PARADIGM. HUMAN RIGHTS LEARNING IS DIFFERENT.
1. Human rights learning (HRL) is necessary, precisely because knowledge in traditional capacity building in development work has been much fragmented to the disciplinary realm. Conversely, HRL is about how we conceive and carry out a critical and transformative learning experience for HRL participants. The question then is: Which would these key critical and transformative capacities that graduates will have at the end of their learning be? A critical education for us means providing the tools to change a society that is organized around relations of oppression and that keeps generating inequality.