Enforcement of Plant Breeders' Rights
Plant variety protection rights (PVP) are the driving force of breeding progress; they ensure adequate benefits from the breeders' achievements by safeguarding his intellectual property rights. As in many other specialities, this protection of intellectual property is vital to re-finance the expensive research and development that is needed to develop a new plant variety. The plant breeding community has joined forces to set up an organisation entrusted with safeguarding these protection rights - the Saatguttreuhandverwaltungs-GmbH (STV) is acting on behalf of approximately 50 plant breeding companies to enforce plant variety protection rights.
- STV is charged with monitoring the correct fulfilment of the terms of the license agreements concluded between the PVP right holders and the seed producers and distributors.
- Purchasing and selling cereal food grains for sowing purposes both constitute a violation of plant variety protection rights. This so-called black-market trade in seeds causes millions of euros of losses, with particularly severe economic consequences to the small and medium-sized breeders. The German breeding companies have entrusted STV with fighting black market activities and with relentlessly pursuing any violations.
- Since the ratification of the UPOV Convention of 1991, intellectual property in plant varieties has passed into international law, which has been transposed into German national legislation in 1997. Since then, a farm saved seed royalty has to be paid every time farm saved seed of protected plant varieties is used. The breeders have entrusted STV with the billing and collection of these royalties.
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