1. Adequate Food is a Human Right

"Rights-based approach" is the current catch word among the United Nations agencies and many NGOs. But what rights are they talking about and what does it mean for those of us working to protect and promote breastfeeding?
Prior to the shift to a "rights-based approach", agencies and NGOs based their policies and actions on the "needs" of the people for whom they worked. The agencies, NGOs and also governments made promises to fulfil these needs. Fulfilling needs is charity and depends on the good will of the giver. Changing to a "rights-based approach" means a total rethinking of this relationship. In doing so governments and agencies can no longer base their policies on people's needs but upon their human rights. What were once promises and charity become moral and legal obligations.
Most people working with IBFAN are familiar with the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) (see BB no. 24) and how it guarantees parents and children's access to information and support in the use of basic knowledge of the advantages of breastfeeding. The text from the CRC can be placed in the broader concept of the Right to Adequate Food. This right is guaranteed in article 25 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and article 11 of the 1966 International Convenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Since breastfeeding and breastmilk are far superior to any breastmilk substitute, the term "adequate food" means breastfeeding.
One of the outcomes of the World Food Summit of 1996 was a call for the drafting of new international instrument specifically for the implementation of the Right to Adequate Food. Several NGOs active in the right to food movement drafted such a code of conduct which has subsequently been endorsed by approximately 800 NGOs. The objective of this process is to advocate that the Human Rights Commission and the FAO Committee on Food Security draw-up an international instrument incorporating this code of conduct.
The International Code of Conduct on the Human Right to Adequate Food can become another advocacy tool for IBFANers. Several articles specifically address our campaign to protect breastfeeding. Under Section A: State Obligations at the national Level, Article 6.1 reads "...The state must also protect the right of women to breastfeed their babies for at least six months of life". Article 6.2 goes on to read "The obligation to protect includes the state's responsibility to ensure that private entities or individuals, including transnational corporations over which they exercise jurisdiction, do not deprive individuals of their access to adequate food". Section D deals with the Regulation of Economic Enterprises and other Actors. Its Article 9.1 reads "States will take all necessary steps to prevent individuals, corporations or other non-state actors from obtaining pecuniary benefits or advantages of any sort by interfering with the enjoyment of the right to adequate food, even if that action has taken place in another country. States are under the duty to prohibit such acts and prosecute those responsible for them. Economic enterprises, including transnational corporations, must be subject to regulations both at the national and international levels, ensuring that their activities do not adversely affect access to food..." Part 7 of the Code ensures reporting and monitoring through the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).
NGOs are currently working with FAO and the OHCHR to incorporate the Code of Conduct into an international instrument. Breastfeeding advocates can learn how they can contribute to this effort by contacting FIAN-International, P.O. Box 10 22 43, D-69012 Heidelberg, Germany. tel: +49 622 183 0620, fax +49 622