The Right to Food and the WTO: April 8, 2009

The Right to Food and the WTO

Date: Wednesday, April 8 Time: 3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. A light reception will follow.
Location: Carnegie Endowment Speaker: Olivier De SchutterDiscussants: Gawain Kripke, Steven Schonberger Moderator: Sandra Polaski
What is the relationship between the fundamental human right to food and the global trade regime? Trade policy has important implications for food security worldwide: it can contribute to food security by facilitating the movement of available food from areas of abundance to areas of scarcity, but it can also create risks, as experienced during the food crisis of the past two years.

UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Prof. Olivier De Schutter, recently completed the first-ever report on the relationship between the trade regime in agriculture and the human right to adequate food, as recognized under international law. He will present recommendations on the role agricultural trade should play in the future, drawing lessons from both the food crisis and the emerging threat of climate change.


Speaker

Olivier De Schutter
Professor De Schutter was appointed by the Human Rights Council of the United Nations as Special Rapporteur on the right to food in March 2008. His three-year mandate is to monitor and report on the right to food to the UN General Assembly and Human Rights Council. A specialist in human rights, Olivier De Schutter teaches at the University of Louvain (Belgium) and the College of Europe (Natolin Campus, Poland). He is a Visiting Professor at Columbia University and a Member of the Global Law School Faculty of New York University. He was also previously Secretary General of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH).

Discussants
Gawain Kripke
Gawain Kripke is Senior Policy Advisor on international trade issues with Oxfam America, based in Washington, DC. He directs the policy work of the organization's Make Trade Fair campaign and has authored numerous opinion pieces and briefing papers on trade and development issues. Prior to joining Oxfam, Kripke served as director of economic programs for the environmental organization Friends of the Earth.

Steven Schonberger (invited)
Steven Schonberger is Lead Operations Officer for Rural Development in the East Asia and Pacific Region of the World Bank. Mr. Schonberger has worked on agricultural and rural development issues in Africa, Asia and Latin America, and has focused on issues of agricultural and rural strategy, land reform, rural finance, and community based agricultural development. Mr. Schonberger has published articles on microfinance, land reform, fisheries management, agricultural trade policy and natural resources governance.
Moderator

Sandra Polaski
Sandra Polaski is a senior associate and director of the Trade, Equity, and Development Program at the Carnegie Endowment. Polaski served as the U.S. Secretary of State’s special representative for International Labor Affairs, the senior official representing the State Department on international labor.