According to estimates by FAO2, 500 million family farms produce over 80% of the world’s food, 475 million of which are farms of less than two hectares in size. The dominant form of seed system that supports these farmers is informal in nature, and is responsible for 80% of total seed supply. This informal seed system is characterised by being culturally-oriented, environmentally-friendly, localised, participatory and heterogeneous. The nature of the seed system is also important in European countries, where organic farmers are seeking to re-appropriate the intellectual and physical nature of their seed supplies to better align with their values.
For the purpose of this Fellowship, these initiatives, which generate economic benefits through the participatory management of agro-biodiversity, are called Agro-biodiversity Management Enterprises (AMEs). AMEs focus on adapting, experimenting with and releasing - on a commercial scale – plant varieties with local adaptation, as well as produce and products from these varieties. Their main market focus is the local economy, and the seeds and varieties come not only from the commercial seed sector and research organisations, but also from informal sources.
The main objective of Eco- Broker has been to develop business models capable to sustain decentralised and participatory crop breeding, and hence support the maintenance of these local varieties. The project had a particular interest in both exploring how changes can be induced to transition from linear to interactive, collective institutions and mind-sets, and to involve consumers as key actors in reorienting demand-driven seed systems.
In order to achieve the above mentioned objective during the project life of 26 August 2019 to 28 January 2022 (extended owing to Covid delays), Eco-Broker implemented 5 work packages: WP 1 Entrepreneurship, WP 2 Defining AMEs, WP 3 Developing Action Learning, WP 4 Dissemination of findings and WP 5 Project Management.
