- Record: found
- Abstract: found
- Article: found
Bioleft: open-source seeds for low-input farming systems
Abstract
This article describes Bioleft, an ‘open source’, highly collaborative seed breeding initiative, in order to encourage reflection on potential synergies with fair trade ideas and practices. Bioleft aims to develop and redistribute collective agency over seed breeding, as a response to the emergence of an oligopolistic seed industry. It is experimenting with novel approaches to seed innovation that increase the diversity of crop varieties, in order to support agricultural practices that are ignored by mainstream seed firms, particularly small-scale family farming and more ecologically and socially sustainable agricultural practices. More generally it is experimenting with new forms of social and productive organization based on norms of sharing and solidarity.
Content
Author and article information
References
Baden, T., Chagas, A. M., Gage, G., Marzullo, T., Prieto-Godino, L. L. and Euler, T. (2015). Open Labware: 3-D printing your own lab equipment. PLoS Biology, 13(3).
Benkler, Y. (2006). The wealth of networks: How social production transforms markets and freedom. New Haven (CT) and London: Yale University Press.
Falcon, W. and Fowler, C. (2002). Carving up the commons: emergence of a new international regime for germplasm development and transfer. Food Policy, 27, 197-222.
Fess, T.L., Kotcon, J.B. and Benedito, V.A. (2011). Crop breeding for low input agriculture: a sustainable response to feed a growing world population. Sustainability, 3, 1742-1772.
Fulton, M. and Giannakas, K. (2001). Agricultural biotechnology and industry structure. AgBioForum, 4(2), 137-151.
Howard, P.H. (2015). Intellectual property and consolidation in the seed industry. Crop Science, 55, 2489-2495.
IPES-Food (2016). From uniformity to diversity: A paradigm shift from industrial agriculture to diversified agroecological systems. International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems. http://www.ipes-food.org/_img/upload/files/UniformityToDiversity_FULL.pdf.
Kotschi, J. and Horneburg, B. (2018). The Open Source Seed Licence: A novel approach to safeguarding access to plant germplasm. PLoS Biology, 16(10): e3000023.
Luby, C.H., Kloppenburg, J., Michaels, T.E. and Goldman, I.L. (2015). Enhancing freedom to operate for plant breeders and farmers through open source plant breeding. Crop Science, 55, 2581-2488.
Piesse, C. and Thirtle, C. (2010). Agricultural R&D, technology and productivity. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 365, 3035-3047.
Quilley, S., Hawreliak, J. and Kish, K. (2016). Finding an alternative route: Towards open, eco-cyclical, and distributed production. Journal of Peer Production, 9.
Schenkelaars, P., de Vriend, H. and Kalaitzandonakes, N. (2011). Drivers of consolidation in the seed industry and its consequences for innovation. Report for COGEM (Commissie Genetische Modificatie). Wageningen (NL): Schenkelaars Biotechnology Consultancy.
Tripp, R. and Louwaars, N. (1997). Seed regulation: Choices on the road to reform. Food Policy, 22, 433-446.
Van Zwanenberg, P., Fressoli, M., Arza, V., Smith, A. and Marin, A. (2017). Open and collaborative developments, STEPS Working Paper 98, Brighton: STEPS Centre.
Weber, S. (2004). The success of open source. Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press.