We know that four-fifths of our food is grown by people on small plots, with less than 25% of the world's cultivated land and one-fifth of the water used for agriculture globally. In other words, the small farmers feed the world for the most part. A primary input for this is seeds, but they are increasingly at risk.

The pressures they put on the seed are getting bigger. The desire to appropriate them is advancing in Costa Rica. The obligation to use certified seeds in agriculture endangers the survival of native seeds since under the scheme of this proposed law of file #21087, the trade of non-certified seeds will be typified as a crime. At the same time, there are resistance processes in the country that try to stop the appropriation of life and its collective fruit.

In Costa Rica, between 75% and 85% of the seeds used are native seeds, free seeds, and public domain. A small part of the seeds is owned by companies, which have assumed ownership. Something very important is at stake since a simple law this could change our relationship with seeds and the most serious thing is that this would take away the right to use seeds from thousands of people.

Farmers and indigenous people have created, multiplied, improved, and protected seeds since the beginning of agriculture, some twelve thousand years ago. A great deal of work has transformed wild plants into food wonders, such as corn. Thousands of hands, heads, and hearts have created and cared for this heritage that allows us to feed ourselves. This has been possible only due to its free distribution, without restrictions or intellectual property. This legacy must be protected and the only way to keep it from disappearing is to encourage seeds to continue to be exchanged, and bartered and to continue sowing seeds freely.

It is urgent to defend these processes full of life and collective creation, which seek a fairer field, recognizing the work of millions of silent beings who find the fertile germ of autonomy in each small action.