12/05/2016

Chile has ratified the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture becoming the 137^th Contracting Party to the Treaty and increasing the membership of the Treaty in the South American Region. After fulfilling the legal processes, the Treaty has already entered into force in Chile.

The Treaty seeks the conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic resources for food and agriculture and the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising from their use, in harmony with the Convention on Biological Diversity, for sustainable agriculture and food security.

Chile has a great biodiversity of habitats with 5105 vascular plant species and 5739 taxa of plants of which 50 percent have their origin in the country. A significant number of old varieties of traditional crops have developed in the country such as potatoes, corn, quinoa and beans.  Chile is also the centre of origin of strawberry (Fragaria chiloensis) and potato (Solanum tuberosum, subspecies tuberosum).

The country has important traditional crop varieties that have adapted to different agriculture and climatic conditions like oats, barley, lentils, potatoes, tomatoes, wheat, and garlic among others.

“By becoming a Contracting Party, Chile has automatic access to a global gene pool of more than 1.7 million accessions of food crops included in the Multilateral System for research, training and breeding”, said the Secretary of the International Treaty Dr Shakeel Bhatti.

“Chile has played a critical role in the discussions of the negotiation phase of the Treaty and its membership will give its Government the opportunity to actively participate in the enhancement process of the Treaty’s main operational systems to maintain and increase the relevance of this international law instrument”, he added.

“We are very satisfied that our country ratified this multilateral agreement, which was presented at the National Congress by our Government in 2009. It is another step in our commitment towards the protection and enhancement of our agrifood heritage while representing an opportunity for the development of our agriculture sector”, said Chilean Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Carlos Furche. 

“Becoming a Contracting Party to this Treaty, will allow us to participate in defining, among other matters, international rules on access and benefit sharing arising from the utilization of genetic resources for food and agriculture, joining other countries from Latin America and the Caribbean region”, added Minister Furche.

The FAO Representative in Chile, Eve Crowley, said that with the accession to this treaty "Chile will adopt according to its national legislation, the protection of traditional knowledge relevant to plant genetic resources and the right to participate in the distribution, conservation and utilization of the benefits arising out of these resources ".

The International Treaty recognizes the significant contribution that farmers and local indigenous communities of all regions of the world, particularly those in the centres of origin and crop diversity have made and will continue to make to the conservation and development of the plant genetic resources that constitute the basis of our food and agriculture production.

Chile is also a member of the FAO’s Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture and has submitted two national reports on this matter. According to the last one, Chile conserves around 67,000 accessions of around 600 species.  The major crop collections are cereals, legumes, vegetables and forages, many of them held at the Agriculture and Research Institute (INIA) of the Ministry of Agriculture the major holder of these ex-situ resources.