PELUM Zimbabwe gave a presentation on diversified agroecological systems at the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Green Friday event which was held on 16 November 2018 in Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare.
The Green Friday is an annual gathering that brings together UN employees and partners to promote healthy and climate friendly lifestyles. The 2018 Green Friday event was held under the theme Climate Change, Environment and Food and it was attended by UN employees, civil society organisations, private sector and smallholder farmers who discussed how they could adopt green lifestyles.
“It would be a shame to find out that the very same people who condemn industries and businesses for polluting the environment and releasing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere are embedded into and have adopted the very same food and agriculture system they condemn,” said Theophilus Mudzindiko, PELUM Zimbabwe Programmes Officer.
Speaking at the event, Mudzindiko initiated a discussion on seed and food sovereignty, highlighting that food sovereignty is dependent upon seed sovereignty.
“Walking into a supermarket and buying what you want is not food sovereignty as you have no control on where and how the food was produced. It is short sighted and selfish when people continue to support food systems that place money before everything else and disregards the very ecosystem that sustains life,” said Mudzindiko.
Mudzindiko’s presentation was supported by presentations from the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Community Technology Development Trust (CTDT), Bio-Innovation Zimbabwe (BIZ) and UNDP who spoke about current global food, health and nutrition, global food wastage, healthy lifestyles that people could adopt and how food consumption impacts the global carbon footprint.
PELUM Zimbabwe believes that seed (food) sovereignty is critical for food, nutrition and income security, health and social wellbeing, environmental sustainability and climate resilience.
“This is the direction the world needs to take and it begins at an individual level,” said Mudzindiko.
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