Seed systems for climate-resilient and just food futures

The global challenges of climate change, biodiversity loss and food injustice call for urgent and radical transformations in our food systems. The seed systems upon which our food depends are a critical component of climate resilience. Farmers and community-based seed savers have been custodians of crop and genetic diversity for millennia and are key players in ensuring just and climate-resilient seed systems into the future. Yet they remain largely overlooked and undervalued in climate-resilience thinking. Farmer-led and community-based seed systems require urgent attention and support in policy and legislative frameworks to realise just climate resilience. Drawing on a study conducted through the Farming for Climate Justice Project, this brief highlights the role of farm-saved seed for climate resilience from the perspective of seed savers from the nation of Wales in the United Kingdom, and the district of Vhembe in the Limpopo Province of South Africa. It outlines steps that governments, civil society, and international organisations can take to support farmer-led and community-based climate resilient seed systems and networks.