Seeds, sovereignty and free trade in Chile

Watercolour by Zinzi Sánchez @z_i_n_z_i_art for Ojalá.

Opinion • Andrea Sato • October 26, 2023 • Leer en castellano

The climate in central Chile is mild, and the soil fertile. Those of us who were born on this narrow strip of land have long enjoyed eating fruits from the walnut, orange, lime and apple trees that are part of the urban landscape on edges of the capital.

My grandmother used to spend most of her days in a large garden in her backyard. Surrounded by plants, she’d be bent over in her flowered, sky-blue apron with great big pockets where she’d store the drawings that I’d give her daily after breakfast. 

In the summer, our favorite place was beneath the wisteria, an enormous bush that can live for a century and flowers every spring. That’s where we’d cool off in the afternoons after picking grapes that grew on the vines that grew over part of the garden. My grandmother would prepare packages of grapes for the whole family, and she’d put some away to share with the birds who helped care for her backyard arbour.

At the end of the season, only the dry, rickety grape skeletons remained, along with all of the fallen seeds. My grandmother patiently collected each seed and put them in her apron pockets, where the dirt mingled with my drawings. She’d tell me that she’d use some of them for her arthritis and the rest she’d sow again the following year. Most of the fruit trees in that home came from seeds my great-grandmother brought with her from the country to the city when she was forced to marry at 14.

My grandmother Guillermina cared for those trees and seeds her whole life. When she died, so did her garden. This practice of cultivation and conservation that I and many other children observed in our grandmothers, as well as in communities engaged in small-scale farming, is today an activity in danger of going extinct. 

Monocultures, exports and exploitation

Chile’s “developmental” model is focused on agribusiness exports, in which large parts of the agricultural sector, including seeds, are determined by the economic terms of commercial Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). Chile has signed more commercial agreements than any other country in the world. In 1996, Chile signed its first FTA with Canada. Since then, it has entered into 33 others, with more than 60 countries.

The commercial agreements that Chile has adopted over the past 30 years have encouraged the privatization of native seeds, forcing farmers to buy genetically modified seeds from providers approved by Chile’s largest commercial partners, like China, the European Union and the United States. Farmers buy pre-approved seeds so that they can remain self-sufficient as farmers, as well as to ensure they can sell what they grow.

Chile’s export based production model is closely bound to the increased use of GMO seeds and monocrops, which degrade the soil and cause desertification. The process of “replacing” organic seeds with GMO monocultures has led to an alarming increase in the use of fungicides and pesticides, as altered seeds are more resistant to chemicals. 

Of 400 active fungicides registered in Chile, 102 are classified as very dangerous. A majority of those 102 very dangerous fungicides are present in pesticides that are regularly used in agricultural production so as to guarantee the fulfillment of export quotas, which are conditions set by countries buying Chilean exports. 

Today, food exports make up most of Chile’s agricultural sector, and exporters are locked into compliance standards set by purchasing countries. Between 2012 and 2021, food production destined for external markets grew almost 13 percent. Chile’s most important agricultural exports are fruits like cherries, grapes, apples and blueberries. 

Over the last decades, the amount of food grown for self-sufficiency has dropped sharply, while imports of food produced outside of Chile have increased. This is especially true with regard to legumes. Between 1979 and 1980, over 200,000 hectares were cultivated for legumes nationally. This number has since decreased drastically, dropping to 22,578 hectares in 2019. Today, only a quarter of the legumes consumed in Chile are locally grown. 

The slow decline of food sovereignty and the decrease of small-scale production of basic foodstuffs like wheat, corn and legumes puts food security at risk. External markets now determine the availability of basic provisions for Chilean homes.

Those most affected by these pesticides and agrotoxins are the farmers who handle them. The neurological effects caused by prolonged exposure to pesticides are well known, as are other impacts, including cancer. 

Against free trade, in defense of seeds

Chile has seen massive opposition to regional Free Trade Agreements, especially against the controversial Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP11) agreement. The TPP11 privatizes seeds by expanding intellectual property claims over some varieties and favoring patented GMO seeds. 

The TPP11 agreement is designed to promote commercial integration among Pacific nations (Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam). It was signed in 2018 in the face of protests which kicked off the year prior, when the content of the agreement was revealed. It came into force in Chile in 2023.

The government of Gabriel Boric has turned a blind eye to resistance in the face of deepening colonial logics and economic dependence on global economic powers. This is true even as Boric’s policy agenda promises to analyze active commercial agreements and prevent the signing of future treatises.

Free Trade Agreements foster exploitation, and have the potential to decimate food sovereignty and agroecology. The fight against them is intertwined with ancestral resistance to conserve local seeds and sustainable modes of production that respect the earth’s natural cycles. 

In this context, keeping seeds, like my grandmother did in her garden, is another form of resistance, a way of fighting for the earth and keeping gardens alive.