1. Introduction; 2. Food, biotechnology and intellectual property; 3. Methodology: principles and sources under international law; 4. Specifying the nature of the obligations and the approach for understanding economic, social and cultural human rights; 5. The right to food as recognized in the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights; 6. The right to benefit from the moral and material interests of scientific production and the right to enjoy benefits from scientific progress and its applications; 7. The justifiable limitations to the recognized rights; 8. The TRIPS agreement, particulary patent protection; 9. Effective Sui generis systems for the protection of new varieties of plants; 10. Jurisdictional and jurisprudential issues under the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights and the TRIPS agreement; 11. Principles for identifying and solving conflicts between treaties, as well as identifying the nature of treaties, applied to TRIPS and the covenant; 12. Conflict or compatibility between human rights and patent and plant variety protection?