Our legal framework is modified to make effective a human right fundamental: the right to the feeding. Did it not exist? Formally yes, but it was essential to create and develop the necessary guarantees so that its owners can actually exercise it. It is not a simple task, because it is a right where food follows the logic of the market. New guidelines are established to change the mercantilist model that has permeated the system food of our country. A model that put profit first without considering the rights of people to one feeding adequate and sustainable. Which has repercussions on the economic, cultural and political model.
Article 4 of the Constitution(since the reform of October 13, 2011), ordered that “Every person has the right to nutritious food, sufficient and of quality. The State will guarantee it.” However, this right It did not have regulatory provisions that created the necessary conditions to exercise it. Until now, because last Wednesday, April 17, the “General Law of the Feeding Adequate and Sustainable” (LGAADyS), which was approved unanimously by all political forces, in compliance with the constitutional mandate and the international treaties signed by Mexico.
The new general law regulates, for the first time, the right to feeding, (after an omission of more than 12 years), through the establishment of primary guarantees that allow it to materialize and that attempts to answer: What is the content of the right? Which authorities are responsible for promoting, protecting and guaranteeing it? What instruments do we have to demand it? What are its scope and limits? Through what strategies and policies will it become a reality?
We are talking about a pressing need, which could not wait, especially if we take into account that, in Mexico, 46.8 million inhabitants live in poverty, of which, 9.1 live in extreme poverty, according to the “ Poverty results in Mexico 2022”, published by the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (CONEVAL). Among the social deprivations suffered by people in this situation of poverty is precisely food deficiency. 23 million people have “lack of access to nutritious, quality food at home.”
In the results of the “National Survey of Household Income and Expenses” (ENIGH) 2022 of the INEGI, it is noted that of the total number of households in the country (37.5 million), 41% (15.4 million households) experienced some difficulty meeting their food needs due to lack of money or resources in the last three months.
These serious problems, which expose the profound social inequalities that our country experiences, demonstrate the urgent need to regulate a basic good: food. Such an important right cannot be left adrift, following the logic of excessive profit. Obviously the rules must change. In the exercise of this right, the importance of food sovereignty must be recognized.
According to the Nyéléni Declaration of February 2007 in Mali, “food sovereignty is the right of people to nutritious and culturally appropriate food, accessible, produced in a sustainable and ecological way, and their right to decide their own food system.” and productive”, which has a direct impact on the health, growth and progress (present and future) of people. This implies putting the people who “produce, distribute and consume food at the heart of food systems and policies, above the demands of markets and companies.” That future generations be considered, as established by the aforementioned Forum.
Article 20, section XXIII, of the LGAADyS, defines food sovereignty as “the ability of the people of Mexico to freely establish the country's priorities in terms of production, supply and access to adequate food for the entire population, based on national production and including the choice of techniques and technologies that are optimal to guarantee the well-being of people.”
Article 3 of the LGAADyS states that “all people, individually or collectively, have the right to a proper nutrition at all times, and to have food for daily consumption, as well as physical and economic access to safe food, of nutritional quality and in sufficient quantity to satisfy their physiological needs at all stages of their life cycle that enable their development. integral and a dignified life, in accordance with their cultural context and their specific needs, without jeopardizing the satisfaction of other basic needs and without hindering the enjoyment of other human rights.
He Right to Food It includes not only “the ability to satisfy dietary needs” according to the combination of nutritional products and physical activity to satisfy human physiological needs at all stages of the life cycle, according to sex and occupation; but includes the availability and physical access to food; economic access; sustainability, so that food production has a reduced environmental impact, with respect for biodiversity and ecosystems, in order to enable access to food for present and future generations; biocultural richness, emphasizing gastronomic diversity and agrobiodiversity, which recognizes the link between food and culture; as well as access, disposal and sanitation of water for personal and domestic consumption in a sufficient, healthy, acceptable and affordable manner.
In accordance with the Fifth Transitory Article of the LGAADyS, within 360 calendar days after the entry into force of this Decree (which was on April 18), the legislatures of the federal entities must make the necessary legislative adjustments, to regulate and develop the exercise of the right to food.
With what money will they do it? The sixth transitional article of the same law establishes that the obligations and expenditures generated as a result of the entry into force of this Decree will be subject to the resources expressly approved for these purposes in the respective expenditure budgets of the authorities responsible for the three government orders, so no extensions to its budget will be authorized for the current and subsequent fiscal years.
More from the same author:
#food #food #sovereignty
