[Reader-list] Articles on Right to Food

[Shuddhabrata Sengupta]

Dear Rakesh,

Thank you for posting articles on the right to food. This follows  
also on the discussions initiated by Rana's excellent article on  
Delhi (which I appreciate very much despite my reservations about his  
deployment of the word 'socialism)

I hope their can be fruitful discussion on these matters. And that  
the list will once again demonstrate that it is not willing to be  
monopolized by the petty and paranoiac agenda of Hindutva and  
Nationalism.

regards

Shuddha


On 31-Jul-09, at 10:15 AM, Rakesh Iyer wrote:

> Dear all
>
> Having been inspired by Taha jee's constant articles on the UID, I  
> have
> thought that we also need to pass on articles on other issues as  
> well. And
> therefore, I have decided to post articles on the Right to Food, an
> important issue which needs to be looked at. This issue is  
> important for
> people of all religions as well, so unlike say the UID, it won't  
> have a bias
> too. And plus of course, it's something which needs to be looked at
> seriously for the huge no. of poor people in this country.
>
> To begin with, I post this article from livemint.com, which talks  
> about how
> we can tackle India's hunger. I think it would be of great use for  
> us to
> understand this issue, for it really gives them freedom from  
> hunger, and
> makes it an entitlement for them. Combined with NREGA and RTI, it  
> would be
> nothing short of revolutionary to achieve them. And as Pawan ji's  
> status msg
> always says: 'The revolution is not an apple that falls when it is  
> ripe. You
> have to make it fall'. And efforts are being made to fall the apple.
>
> Regards
>
> Rakesh
>
> Link:
> http://www.livemint.com/2009/07/02205358/How-to-tackle-India8217s- 
> hu.html
> How to tackle India’s hunger
> As India starts legislating on food security, there is much it  
> could learn
> from laws and practices abroad
>  Biraj Patnaik
>
>
> The manifesto of the Congress party promised the enactment of a  
> Right to
> Food Act, if the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) was voted back  
> to power.
> A preliminary shape of such an Act has emerged in what was reported  
> in the
> media as the very first letter from Congress president Sonia Gandhi  
> to Prime
> Minister Manmohan Singh. The UPA government hopes to repeat through  
> the
> passage of this Act what it had achieved during its last term  
> through the
> National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)—a vision for more  
> inclusive
> governance.
>
> [image: Indranil Bhoumik / Mint]
>
> Indranil Bhoumik / Mint
>
> At the heart of the idea of the right to food is a very simple  
> premise. That
> no citizen of a country should go hungry, and that each citizen  
> should at
> all times have physical access to, or the means to acquire, adequate
> nutritious food. It is time India delivered on this.
>
> Few countries in the world can claim to have achieved this fully,  
> and, till
> recently, fewer still have legislated it. The reasons for this are not
> difficult to comprehend. Only a handful of developed countries have  
> the
> resources and the social commitment to welfarism to make this happen.
>
> Some countries, such as the US, which actually have the resources  
> to achieve
> the goal of a country free from hunger, do not legislate it. To  
> them, such
> socio-economic rights are seen as a throwback to the Cold War, when  
> the
> international debates between the socialist block and the US were  
> on the
> superiority of civil and political rights over socio-economic rights.
>
> But the idea of nation states guaranteeing citizens the right to  
> food is not
> a new one. Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,  
> adopted
> by all United Nations member states in 1948, lists among a state’s
> obligation the right to food.
>
> Closer home, article 21 of the Constitution, which provides a  
> fundamental
> right to life and personal liberty, has been repeatedly interpreted  
> by the
> Supreme Court as enshrining within it the right to food. Article 47  
> obliges
> the Indian state to raise the standard of nutrition of its people.
>
> Despite this, India continues to have one of the worst track records
> globally, as far as the commitment to tackle hunger and  
> malnutrition is
> concerned. The last round of the National Family Health Survey in 2006
> confirmed that the child malnutrition rate in India is 46%, almost  
> double
> that of sub-Saharan Africa. India, the world’s second fastest growing
> economy, ranks 66th among the 88 countries surveyed by the  
> International
> Food Policy Research Institute (Ifpri) in the Global Hunger Index  
> (2008),
> below Sudan, Nigeria and Cameroon, and slightly above Bangladesh.
>
> Yet, India has also seen some of the most remarkable judicial activism
> anywhere in the world on the right to food. The landmark *PUCL v.  
> Union of
> India and others (2001)* case, better known as the right to food  
> case, has
> seen at least 60 orders over the last eight years, and has emerged  
> as the
> longest continuing mandamus—a legal writ where the court orders a  
> person or
> entity to do something—in the world on the right to food. Somehow,  
> until
> recently, this judicial activism hasn’t translated into  
> legislation. Now is
> the opportunity for India to deliver—and learn from similar  
> legislation
> abroad.
>
> Over the last few years, there has been a slew of legislation  
> across the
> world which recognize the right to food as a fundamental right and  
> provide
> state guarantees.
>
> South Africa was among the first countries in the world to explicitly
> guarantee the right to food in its constitution through its Bill of  
> rights.
> The Brazilian constitution in 1998 introduced a minimum wage to  
> meet basic
> needs, including food; the constitution was further modified in  
> 2003 to
> introduce the concept of social rights for every citizen, including  
> the
> right to food. This process culminated in Brazil’s Nutritional  
> Security
> Framework Law (Losan) in 2006, which created a set of institutions for
> monitoring the right to food, and is likely to be the most lasting  
> legacy of
> President Luiz Inacio Lula de Silva. Article 16 of the Bolivian  
> constitution
> explicitly states, “Every person has the right to water and food.  
> The State
> has the obligation to guarantee food security for all through healthy,
> adequate and sufficient food.” Even Belarus and Moldova have clear
> constitutional guarantees on the right to food.
>
> Argentina (2003) and Guatemala (2005) were the first South American
> countries to introduce framework laws on food security, closely  
> followed by
> Ecuador (2006) and Venezuela (2008).
>
> South Africa, Honduras, Peru, Nicaragua and Uganda have already  
> drafted
> right to food legislation that is being actively considered by their
> respective cabinets and parliaments.
>
> So what are the key lessons India can learn from this rich range of
> international experience on right to food legislation and the  
> practice they
> have been put to?
>
> The first key lesson is that of political commitment of the  
> leadership to
> the idea of right to food. A case in point would be a comparison  
> between
> South Africa and Brazil. While South Africa guaranteed the right to  
> food in
> its constitution in 1996 through a Bill of rights, the absence of  
> political
> will to turn this into reality means that millions of South Africans
> continue their daily encounter with hunger. In stark contrast, the
> determination of the Brazilian president to eliminate hunger was  
> evident in
> his inaugural speech when he announced the “*Fome* Zero”, or “Zero  
> Hunger”,
> programme. “We will make it possible for people in our country to  
> eat three
> square meals a day, every day, with no need for hand-outs from  
> anyone.” It
> is this unambiguous commitment that continues to be at the heart of  
> Brazil’s
> battle against hunger.
>
> The second key lesson is convergence. The right to food cuts across
> programmes of many sectors—including health, nutrition, agriculture,
> livelihoods, and labour. This means that in any context, at least a  
> dozen
> ministries will be operating programmes that have some impact on  
> the right.
> Converging all of these under a central leadership is critical. Brazil
> converged as many as 31 programmes which are now overseen by the  
> ministry of
> food security and combating hunger. In the context of India, nine  
> programmes
> run by five ministries, along with agencies such as the Food  
> Corporation of
> India, are the respondents in the right to food case before the  
> Supreme
> Court. It is imperative that our proposed legislation brings  
> together all
> these programmes on a single converged platform. The state  
> government of
> Delhi is currently undertaking a “Mission Convergence” with  
> precisely this
> objective in mind.
>
> The third key lesson is creating a system of not just  
> administrative, but
> also legal recourse. This is a key feature of the right to food  
> Acts across
> countries. In Brazil, the public prosecutors’ office take up  
> violations of
> human rights, including socio-economic rights, at the local level.
> Guatemala, Venezuela, Brazil, Peru, Uganda and South Africa have  
> already put
> in place or proposed powerful national commissions that act as  
> oversight
> bodies and also have the power to impose penalties. Although the  
> Supreme
> Court has appointed its own commissioners to monitor the food and  
> employment
> schemes of the Indian government, these commissioners do not have  
> the kind
> of statutory powers to impose penalties that the bodies in other  
> countries
> do.
>
> The fourth key lesson is the involvement of civil society. All  
> countries
> which have legislated the right to food have involved civil society
> organizations, not just in local structures, but also in the  
> national-level
> oversight bodies. Consea, the Brazilian council that oversees the
> implementation of the right to food, has as many as 38 civil society
> representatives. It is important that this engagement is not just  
> in letter,
> but also in spirit, with governments taking civil society as  
> seriously as it
> does its own bureaucracy and legislature. Most other countries have  
> also
> involved civil society in the process of formulating their right to  
> food
> legislation.
>
> Lastly, the key to the success of right to food legislation has been
> flexibility and innovation. Uganda has proposed including the “head  
> of the
> household” as a duty bearer, with penalties—including fines and
> imprisonment—imposed for non-fulfilment of right to food  
> obligations within
> the family. While this may not be a desirable innovation for India,  
> it is
> specific to the national context there. Venezuela, Guatemala and  
> Ecuador
> have a strong component of food sovereignty, with strong safeguards  
> against
> genetically modified foods.
>
> The right to food Acts legislated globally are not only leading to  
> stronger
> legal safeguards for poor and marginalized people, they are also  
> translating
> into other policies and programmes. These include canteens in urban  
> areas
> for the poor that serve cooked food at subsidized prices, cash  
> transfer
> schemes, school meals, supplementary nutrition for infants, minimum  
> food
> guarantees for labour and social security pensions.
>
> While there is a lot that India can learn from the global  
> experience, it can
> also contribute uniquely to the international discourse on  
> legislation on
> the right to food. Most of the laws mentioned above are framework  
> pieces of
> legislation which define the broad parameters of the right to food.  
> The
> Supreme Court has already established very detailed individual  
> entitlements
> that are legally binding on the government. These include universal  
> mid-day
> meals to every child studying in a government-run or aided primary  
> school,
> nutrition, health and preschool education services through the  
> Integrated
> Child Development Services for every child under the age of 6,  
> subsidized
> grain to households living below the poverty line and monthly  
> pensions for
> old people living below the poverty line.
>
> A Right to Food Act that weaves these legally binding entitlements  
> into the
> text and spirit of the law will set a unique precedent globally.  
> Are our
> lawmakers ready to take on this challenge?
>
>
> *Biraj Patnaik is principal adviser to the Supreme Court  
> commissioners on
> the right to food. He has been actively involved in the Right to Food
> Campaign in India. The views expressed in this article are his own.  
> Comments
> are welcome at theirview at livemint.com*
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Shuddhabrata Sengupta
The Sarai Programme at CSDS
Raqs Media Collective
shuddha at sarai.net
www.sarai.net
www.raqsmediacollective.net