This woman shortlisted for Canada’s next five dollar bank note is the founder of one of the country’s first humanitarian aid organisations.
Lotta Hitschmanova was an early Canadian humanitarian. She founded SeedChange in 1945 under the name the Unitarian Service Committee of Canada, or USC Canada, to help Europe rebuild after the horrors of World War II. Over decades under her guidance, USC Canada became one of Canada’s first development agencies.
Lotta Hitschmanova has said, “We are here in this world to help each other and to make this world a better place to live. That is my philosophy of life.”
Lotta Hitschmanova, an outspoken anti-Fascist journalist, WWII refugee and visionary humanitarian, was a force. She dedicated her life to helping people rebuild their lives, working toward equity, and showing a deep respect for the people she sought to support. Her vision and respect are especially evident in her commitment to funding locally-run programs, a value SeedChange maintains to this day.
She led USC Canada from 1945 until 1983. In that time she inspired Canadians to generously donate to support people all around the world, from Europe to India, and Bangladesh to Palestine.
For generations of people in Canada, Dr. Lotta, as she was affectionately called, was a ubiquitous voice on television and radio. Her distinct calls for generosity punctuated Saturday morning cartoons and rang out regularly over the airwaves, making USC Canada’s office at 56 Sparks Street, Ottawa, the most famous address in the country.
Seven decades of impact and counting
Today, SeedChange works towards an equitable world by helping farmers improve their lives by growing healthy food, starting with good seeds.
Famine and civil war in Ethiopia bring the power of seeds and farming to attention. Famine and civil war in Ethiopia bring the power of seeds and farming to our attention. The Seeds of Survival approach is born.
Working with farmers to grow healthy food using good seeds and sustainable practices becomes the NGO’s sole mission in 2007. In 2013, it extends its work to farmers in Canada.
Today’s food system creates injustice, damages the environment, and puts our health at risk.
Seventy per cent of the world’s food is grown by 2 billion family farmers. Nearly half of them live below the poverty line.
Farmers’ work is essential, yet they don’t earn a fair income. Their rights to land and seed are under threat. Women and Indigenous farmers face discrimination, and opportunities for young farmers are hard to come by.
Large-scale industrial farming is not a viable solution. It puts profits from food and seed in the hands of only a few. It accelerates biodiversity loss, contributes to climate change, and contaminates our soil and water.
SeedChange believes in growing a better world
SeedChange partners with family farmers and like-minded nonprofits around the world to reclaim the power of food for good.
When you support SeedChange, you support 35,000 small-scale farmers fighting for justice, health and sustainability. You allow hard-working farmers to break down barriers to healthy and sustainable food, so they can nourish their communities and live better lives.
You can grow a better world with farmers. The proof is in the field.
What SeedChange does on the ground
SeedChange delivers tailored projects that help farmers improve their incomes, defend their rights, and grow better food for all.
It has three decades of experience helping farmers:
- Save, share and breed new seeds directly in the field.
- Restore degraded lands and soil through regenerative techniques.
- Find local solutions to water shortages and climate change.
- Launch successful enterprises and cooperatives to increase their incomes.
SeedChange’s programs are always delivered by local partners. They know their regions and farming communities best. The organisation contributes in five ways.
- As facilitators, sharing knowledge and connecting people working to seed change in different parts of the food system.
- As funders for partners’ work in promoting sustainable agriculture and food sovereignty.
- As trainers, supporting farmers who preserve seed diversity, farm sustainably and bring healthy food to markets.
- As incubators for innovative ideas – it documents successes from the field to help agroecological practices spread.
- As influencers, encouraging policies that support small-scale farmers, protect seed diversity and prioritize sustainable agriculture.
The Seeds of Survival approach
SeedChange believes in local seeds, local knowledge, and communities empowering themselves.
Every SeedChange project is shaped by farmers’ needs and ideas, and designed collaboratively with the local partners who deliver it. Projects SeedChange supports include farmer-to-farmer knowledge exchanges, community seed banks, farmer-led research and plant breeding, and co-ops through which farmers can improve their incomes by bringing healthy food to local markets.
Ecologically sound farming techniques that preserve and enhance biodiversity are at the core of all of its work. The organisation’s guiding principles are food sovereignty and agroecology – two transformative concepts put forward by farmers’ movements to build a just and sustainable world.
SeedChange pioneered its award-winning approach, Seeds of Survival, while working with the Ethiopian Biodiversity Institute to help farmers rebuild after droughts and famine in the late 1980s. It has been building expertise by collaborating with farmers, researchers and partners around the world, including Canada, ever since.
Make a difference
Hard-working farmers around the world need your support.
Click here to donate to Lotta’s cause: https://weseedchange.org/donate
