Guaranteeing the human right to food
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- Assembly
debate on 3 October 2024 (31st sitting) (see Doc. 16041, report of the Committee on Social Affairs, Health and
Sustainable Development, rapporteur: Mr Simon Moutquin). Text adopted by the Assembly on
3 October 2024 (31st sitting).See also Recommendation 2286 (2024).
1. The Parliamentary Assembly is struck
by the extremely paradoxical phenomenon on the European continent
as regards access to food: hunger and malnutrition are still present
even though there are ample supplies of foodstuffs. This co-existence
of plenitude and hunger highlights persistent inequalities that
affect access to healthy, adequate and sustainable food, despite
the resources available.
2. The Assembly believes that climate change, by exacerbating
extreme weather events, agricultural crises and disruptions to supply
chains, is likely to further aggravate these inequalities and pose
growing challenges to ensuring equitable and sustainable access
to healthy, adequate and sustainable food, including to drinking water,
in the decades to come.
3. The challenges surrounding food in Europe are major. People’s
access to reliable and sufficient sources of supply is often compromised
by the absence of effective self-production systems and by climate
change and geopolitical tensions that disrupt traditional supply
chains. Distribution, processing and marketing systems are unbalanced,
penalising small-scale food producers and failing to adequately
protect their rights, in particular depriving them of fair remuneration.
The market logic, which is predominant in certain regions of Europe,
gives priority to commercial and agricultural interests, which are
often in tension with the imperative of the right to food. Instead
of placing individuals, as holders of fundamental rights as regards
access to food, at the forefront, this approach tends to prioritise
evaluating them according to their economic potential and their
overall agricultural activities, which compromises full recognition
of the right to food for all.
4. The Assembly is fully aware of the particular challenges Europe
faces as a result of the war in Ukraine. According to the Ukrainian
authorities, between 15% and 18% of Ukrainian agricultural land
is currently under temporary occupation, while the lands of many
Ukrainian farmers are now either occupied or destroyed. Ukrainian
agriculture, which before the invasion accounted for 10% of global
wheat and barley exports, 15% of corn exports and 50% of sunflower
oil exports, has been severely affected by bombings, landmines and
land contamination.
5. The Assembly is convinced that only a rights-based approach
can provide a cross-cutting and consistent understanding of all
the social, political, economic and cultural factors affecting access
to food and reliably ensure that policies relating to food systems
at all territorial levels are in line with the core content of the
right to food for all.
6. The Assembly points out that this rights-based approach is
underpinned by a robust framework in international law. The right
to food is a fundamental human right enshrined in Article 11 of
the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights,
which all Council of Europe member States have ratified and are
bound to respect, protect and implement.
7. General Comment No. 12 of the United Nations Committee on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights gives practical substance to
the right set out in Article 11 of the covenant. This interpretation
is recognised by the international community as authoritative. According
to this definition, the right to food includes the basic guarantee
of protection from hunger and the obligation of States to progress
towards the full realisation of this right by ensuring that food
is available, accessible, sustainable and adequate for everyone.
8. The Assembly notes that, on this basis, the United Nations
bodies have, for more than twenty years, been developing tools to
provide a framework and explain the specific features of an approach
grounded in the right to food, with the aim of defining and raising
awareness of this right and guiding States in the strategies to be
adopted for its realisation.
9. The Assembly attaches particular importance to the conceptual
and strategic framework developed by the High Level Panel of Experts
on Food Security and Nutrition to transform food systems to meet
the requirements of an approach based on the right to food and to
enable progress to be made towards achieving all the United Nations
Sustainable Development Goals.
10. In the Voluntary guidelines to support the progressive realization
of the right to adequate food in the context of national food security,
adopted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
in 2004, States recognised the need to undertake a constitutional
(or legislative) review that facilitates the progressive realisation
of the right to adequate food. As far back as 1999, the United Nations
Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights recommended that
States adopt a framework law as a major instrument in the implementation
of their national strategy concerning the right to food.
11. The Assembly affirms that a constitutional right to food provides
the strongest possible foundation, by setting an obligation for
all with regard to the right to food. It would oblige public authorities
to take measures to respect and to adopt the necessary laws, policies
and programmes to ensure the respect for, the protection of and
the progressive implementation of this constitutional right.
12. The Assembly further underlines the need to adopt framework
laws that set out the necessary conditions for the governance of
food systems, in line with the FAO’s recommendations. These laws
should cover intersectoral co-ordination, establish guiding principles
to guarantee the right to food and include budgetary provisions
for their implementation.
13. The Assembly notes, however, that none of the constitutions
of the Council of Europe member States explicitly recognises a distinct
right to food, and that there are few constitutions from which it
can be deduced that the right to food is protected as a component
of the right to dignity, health or the environment. Similarly, there
are few legislative provisions that take a global view of the food
chain based on the right to accessible, sustainable and adequate
food.
14. Furthermore, the Assembly points out that positive food law,
namely the standards applicable to the agrifood sector, food safety
and consumer protection, has developed significantly in Council
of Europe member States and in European Union law, although none
of the branches of this law aims to ensure access to food for all.
15. The Assembly welcomes domestic legislation in many member
States which has encouraged the practice of redistributing agricultural
surpluses and unsold food from supermarkets and restaurants as food
aid for the most vulnerable, also linking this practice to the fight
against food waste. Schemes such as these enable the right to be
fed, but do not necessarily go towards the goal of being able to
obtain food to sustain one’s needs in full autonomy.
16. In the light of these elements, the Assembly calls on Council
of Europe member States to:
16.1 explicitly
include the right to food in their constitutional provisions, including
the right of access to drinking water. This constitutional recognition
would guarantee a solid legal basis for the protection of this fundamental
right, obliging all branches of government to place people’s rights
at the heart of food policies and to take concrete steps to respect,
protect and progressively realise this right;
16.2 adopt national framework laws covering the right to food.
These laws should provide a framework for and co-ordinate the different
branches of law and public policies relating to food systems, in
order to ensure a consistent and integrated approach that meets
the requirements of available, accessible, sustainable and adequate
food for all;
16.3 incorporate food security as a central component of their
national and international strategies, which should include the
creation of strategic food reserves, the strengthening of supply
chains and support for local food production systems to mitigate
the impact of global disruptions caused by climate change and geopolitical
tensions;
16.4 give priority to a coherent legal framework to make food
distribution, processing and marketing systems fairer and more stable,
by reducing economic imbalances between public and private players, align
agricultural issues with the objectives of the ecological transition
and support farmers in this transition in an inclusive way, while
ensuring fair remuneration and greater protection of their rights;
16.5 draw on the international legal framework provided by
the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
and other existing international instruments, such as the FAO’s
voluntary guidelines on the right to food and the work of the High
Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition, so as to
develop and implement national and local strategies aimed at the
full realisation of the right to food in line with the United Nations’
One Health approach, which interlinks the health of people, animals
and ecosystems;
16.6 move from a charitable approach to food aid and food provision
for the more vulnerable members of society towards a rights-based
approach ensuring autonomous access to healthy, adequate and sustainable
food for all. This shift should lead to diversification of the forms
of food solidarity and to a situation where emergency aid is no
longer seen as the primary response;
16.7 invest in technological innovations and modern and sustainable
agricultural practices that enhance food production and supply chain
efficiency, which is crucial for building resilient food systems capable
of addressing global food security challenges.
