biodiversity | food sovereignty | agroecology | social justice
We are an environmental justice NGO, established in 1999. We work with smallholder farmers, other civil society organisations and government to ensure that people have control over their food, agricultural processes and resources, and other natural resources, within a biodiverse, agroecological and sustainable system.
As a country and as a world, we face multiple food, energy and climate change crises. Within this context, and with a clear commitment to securing, developing and protecting smallholder farmers’ rights, Biowatch South Africa challenges industrial agriculture and demonstrates agroecology as a means of ensuring biodiversity while attaining food and seed sovereignty and social justice.
Our head office is in Durban and we have a rural office in Mtubatuba, northern KwaZulu-Natal.
After a 10-year battle, Biowatch South Africa gained wide public prominence in 2009 with its victory in the Constitutional Court.
Almost two decades on, and what’s become known internationally as “the landmark Biowatch Case” and a victory for access to information, clarifies that public interest litigants acting in good faith will not have to fear that costs will be awarded against them.