The Future Control of Food: A Guide to International Negotiations and Rules on Intellectual Property, Biodiversity and Food Security

This book is the first wide-ranging guide to the key issues of intellectual property and ownership, genetics, biodiversity and food security. Proceeding from an introduction and overview of the issues, comprehensive chapters cover negotiations and instruments in the World Trade Organization, Convention on Biological Diversity, UN Food and Agriculture Organization, World Intellectual Property Organization, the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants and various other international bodies. The final part discusses the responses of civil society groups to the changing global rules, how these changes affect the direction of research and development, the nature of global negotiation processes and various alternative futures.

Published with IDRC and QIAP.

Geoff Tansey is a researcher and writer on intellectual property, food and agriculture and a Joseph Rowntree Visionary for a Just and Peaceful World. He is lead author of The Food System (1995) and co-editor of The Meat Business (1999) and Negotiating Health (2005). Tasmin Rajotte has worked in the field of sustainable agriculture, food security and environment for a number of years and is the representative for the Quaker International Affairs Programme (QIAP), Ottawa, Canada.