2012 CIOPORA Chronicle

Advocacy and lobbying
The present market
situation is often
characterised by
a supply being
higher than demand.
Although we cannot
say that sales are in
strong decline, there
is definitely some
pressure on the
market with price
levels fluctuating
heavily from one day
to another. Under
these circumstance,
a strong lobbying
effort from
CIOPORA is of
utmost importance.
by Jaap N. Kras
A strong lobbying
effort by CIOPORA
is of utmost importance
If growers suffer, the breeder and
the retailer also suffer. Therefore,
it is in the interest of all potential
partners to cooperate. Cooperation
starts at breeder’s level. A breeder is
often in a rather delicate position as
the industry is incredibly broad in
scope of service and holds a highly
fragmented character. Moreover,
breeding firms face an extremely
high level of competition and the
legal basis to exercise breeder’s rights
is not strong enough.
There are as many opinions as
breeders, but it is in the interests
of all to have one single voice for
the industry in local governments,
supranational organisations, the
European Union, the United
Nations, in multilateral treaties
such as the WIPO and UPOV
treaties on breeder’s rights, patents
and trademarks.
Why are IP rights
a necessity?
As the internationalisation of the
industry steadily progresses to countries
in Asia and Latin America,
not everybody seems to understand
the importance of breeder’s rights
and the opposition against intellectual
property rights, including
breeder’s rights, is growing. Many
of us remember when Italy stated
that it didn’t want to allow patents
on medicines, for moral grounds.
Italians considered it was not ethical
to protect medicines by a patent. We
all know how that ended: nobody
in Italy was willing to invest in
research and Italy didn’t develop any
new medicines for years.
What more can we learn from
history? (the aforementioned ban
on patent rights in Italy doesn’t
Even the legal definition of a breeder is not clear.
exist anymore). History shows that
strong breeder’s rights stimulate
breeding.
As a specific industry evolves from
its pioneers days into an expansion
stage, people start breeding activities
and firms realise the value of
breeder’s rights. People also realise
the value of protecting the fruit of
their own minds by an intellectual
property right. In the early stage of
an economy, everybody can permit
infringement of intellectual properties
of others. There is little to loose.
But as soon as the production
reaches a level that the companies
want to export their products the
need for proper protection of the
varieties starts.
Much work to do
After all those years with breeder’s
right treaties and laws, the discussion
on breeders rights is ongoing.
The legal definition of a breeder
isn’t even clear until now!
Many national breeder’s rights
laws offer the government a penal
weapon to prevent illegal copying
or infringing protected varieties.
In practice, all governments say:
breeders have to protect their rights
themselves and they have to proof
that somebody is misusing their
intellectual property right(s). It is
also up to the breeder’s right owner
to take action against an infringer
and to proof with civil weapons the
misuse and claim the damages.
This has led to the EDV discussions
and, nowadays, the so important
patent – versus breeder’s right
disputes on the breeders’ exemption
(Trips).
I think the truth is in the middle.
We should make the governments
aware of the importance of a
functional breeder’s right system.
The government should create a
transparent clear law system – a law
system that protects the breeder
optimal against infringers.
Only a strong voice of the breeders
helps to explain and clarify these
needs and strengthen the breeders’
position. The international
organisation for the breeders is
CIOPORA. |||
CIOPORA Chronicle April 2012 | www.CIOPORA.org 11