Venezuela
October 15, 2014

Venezuela’s National Assembly approved in first discussion the new Seed Act, which arrived on tuesday to the legislative floor after being debated across the country. This project was revised and built from the hands of the country people, environmentalist and defenders of Venezuelan sovereignty, and aims to preserve the Venezuelan seed which serves for domestic production of GM-free food.

During regular session, the Representative of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, José Ureña, presented to the rest of the legislators the importance of this advanced law. “The seed is a right of peoples, is a world heritage, therefore it cannot be privatized, “said deputy Ureña.

On this subject, he stated that “the seed cannot be patented, because is a living being,” therefore this law “must strengthen ecosocialism, which involves a model of ecological production and ensuring biodiversity and preservation of life on the planet. “

He stressed that the capitalist system conceived that “the seed is private property, and the seed is an object to accumulate wealth”. Within the bill stipulates that Venezuela needs to constitute “a national center for seeds, to revise industrial seeds and must be an external service that works with farmers seeds”, because “the farming seed is an ancient cultural heritage”.

From early morning the Venezuelan people gathered outside the National Assembly to support and welcome the start of discussions of a strategic law for domestic production which would prevent producing multinationals like Monsanto GM seeds to settle in the country .

Source: La Radio del Sur /Press -Venezuelan Embassy in the U.S./ October 15, 2014