CIOPORA Chronicle 2015

IP in the World
The Russian
Federation has been
a member of UPOV
since April 24,
1998. Although the
current Russian PBR
legislation presented
in Chapter 73 of Part
4 of the Russian Civil
Codex corresponds
to the minimum
requirements of the
1991 Act of UPOV,
it contains a number
of specific features.
by Juriy A. Rogovskiy
Plant Variety Protection
in Russian Federation
For instance, the purview of
the law extends to both plant
and animal breeders´ rights,
whereas the plant breeders´ title is
referred to as “a patent on selection
attainment”. The duration of
protection set by the Russian Civil
Codex amounts for 30 years for
all species except vines, tree, fruit
and forest plants, which enjoy a
prolonged period of protection of
35 years.
The patent is issued to either a physical
person – the actual breeder – or
to the employer thereof, in cases
where plant breeding was executed
as a part of the job responsibilities.
In order to be registered, a plant variety
must be distinct, uniform and
stable (DUS). Once the application
for variety registration is filed,
the variety enjoys the provisional
protection. The main requirements
of variety denominations as well as
the provisions of the Russian Civil
Codex guaranteeing the exclusive
character of the breeder’s right
fully correspond to the 1991 UPOV
Standard. The latter implies that
the plant material produced without
a proper authorization by the
title holder, falls under the scope of
the breeder’s right.
PBR application and
registration procedure
An application for a Russian PBR
can be filed for one plant variety at
a time by one or several applicants
as well as by his/their legal representative.
The applicants should
provide a formal application for the
patent on selection attainment, a
plant variety description form, an
application fee payment receipt or
an application for the discount of
the fee. All documents should be
provided in Russian or include the
official translations. It is required
that, while dealing with the Russian
governmental authorities,
foreign citizens and companies
DUS tests
The DUS tests in the Russian
Federation are run in accordance
with the UPOV guidelines. Apart
from running its own DUS tests,
Gossortkomissiya practices the
take-over of the DUS test results
from the competent organs of the
UPOV member states. The DUS
tests are conducted for both: applications
for patents on selection
attainments and applications for
inclusion of plant varieties into the
National register of plants admitted
for use. Once it is determined that
the plant variety corresponds to the
DUS requirements, Gossortkomissiya
draws up the official descripare
represented by the authorized
agents with the seat on the territory
of the Russian Federation.
Preliminary application
The preliminary application check
is undertaken within one month
from the filing date. During this
procedure Gossortkomissiya
defines the priority date, runs the
evaluation of the proposed variety
denomination and reviews the provided
documents. Gossortkomissiya
maintains the right to request
additional or lacking documents,
which must be provided by the
applicant within the defined term.
A successful preliminary check
results in notification of the applicant
along with the clarification
of the further fees, which needs
to be covered to proceed with the
DUS test.
32 www.FloraCulture.eu | CIOPORA Chronicle June 2015