Is Multilateralism Dead? The Lima Breakdown and the Future of Global Seed Cooperation
A Night in Lima That Changed Everything
It was nearly 11 p.m. on the final night of negotiations at the Governing Body meeting of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA). Delegates stared at yet another version of the Chair’s “parking proposal” projected onto a screen. Some rubbed their faces in exhaustion; others whispered anxiously with colleagues. Everyone in the room knew what was coming.
Moments later, the silence confirmed it: GB11 had failed.
After six days of debate in Lima, from 24–29 November 2025, the Governing Body walked away without the agreement the world urgently needed: a deal to enhance the Multilateral System (MLS) of the Plant Treaty. Instead of a modernised framework for access and benefit-sharing, the world was left with a void and the uncomfortable sense that multilateralism in plant genetic resources may be approaching its breaking point.
A System Breaking Down When We Need It Most
The world is confronting rapid climate change, unpredictable pest pressures, and rising demands for sustainable food production. Plant breeders urgently need access to the genetic diversity that fuels innovation. Yet the global system designed to facilitate this access, the MLS, has stalled.
Negotiators in Lima were expected to solve three intertwined challenges at the heart of the MLS enhancement package:
- Expanding Annex I to reflect biological realities
- Addressing Digital Sequence Information (DSI/GSD) in a fair, functional way
- Agreeing on a predictable, equitable benefit-sharing mechanism
Instead, GB11 became a case study in geopolitical fragmentation.
A coalition including Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, the United States, and Canada pushed for immediate adoption of the revised Standard Material Transfer Agreement (SMTA). Many African and GRULAC countries, joined by host country Peru, refused. They demanded the right to reopen the SMTA text, seeing it as inseparable from broader sovereignty concerns around genetic resources.
Multilateralism works when countries accept imperfect solutions for the greater good.
In Lima, few were willing to do that.
Even the Chair’s pragmatic attempt to “park” the SMTA, keeping the text frozen while two expert groups worked on DSI and Annex I, failed. The procedure itself became a fault line. Without consensus on how to move forward, there was no pathway to move forward.
This is the essence of the crisis: a political system designed for cooperation is no longer capable of producing it.
What the Collapse Reveals About Today’s Multilateralism
The failure of GB11 is not an isolated diplomatic disappointment. It is part of a much bigger story: the decline of multilateral cooperation in global agriculture and biodiversity governance.
Across international fora, from climate talks to trade agreements, countries are shifting toward plurilateral or regional alliances where consensus is easier to achieve. The Plant Treaty, once celebrated as a model of global partnership, now shows the same fractures.
Despite this, the seed sector entered Lima with a constructive spirit and a continued commitment to a functional MLS. But resolve alone cannot overcome geopolitical immobility. The negotiations revealed something deeper: countries are increasingly unwilling to cede even limited policy space in exchange for collective solutions.
And when every position becomes a red line, multilateralism has nowhere to go.
For breeders and the seed sector, the consequences are immediate:
- slower research
- reduced access to diversity
- fragmented rules across countries
- higher uncertainty for investment and innovation
The question is no longer whether the MLS needs reform, everyone agrees it does.
The real question is whether the multilateral environment still allows reform to happen.
What Is at Stake Now
With no deal in Lima, the world defaults back to the old SMTA, an instrument widely understood to be inadequate for today’s scientific and economic realities.
Without a modernised MLS, the governance of plant genetic resources could drift toward:
- bilateral agreements
- opaque access procedures
- increased transaction costs
- legal uncertainty for all users
Such a system benefits neither fairness nor efficiency. It benefits only those who can navigate complexity, and leaves everyone else behind.
Meanwhile, new tensions are rising. Farmers’ Rights have become increasingly politicised within Treaty discussions, creating yet another arena where competing visions of sovereignty and equity collide.
These issues will not dissipate before GB12. If anything, they may intensify.
A Critical Moment for Leadership
The path forward is clear, and has been for years. A predictable, inclusive, innovation-friendly MLS is both possible and urgently needed. The seed sector, researchers, and progressive policymakers have outlined workable solutions.
What is missing is political will.
As long as genetic resources are treated as bargaining chips instead of shared global assets, the Treaty will remain trapped in cycles of stalemate. And in a world facing accelerated climate and food security challenges, time is no longer a luxury.
GB11 was more than a failed negotiation.
It was a warning.
If multilateralism is not dead, Lima showed that it is in critical condition, and in urgent need of renewed commitment, courage, and cooperation.
