ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines the key features of the Act, focusing especially on the types of intellectual property that the law makes available for different categories of plant varieties, including those developed by private sector breeders, public sector researchers, and farmers, respectively. It provides a brief summary of the procedures to which applicants must adhere to register their plant varieties and to obtain plant variety rights certificates in India. The chapter highlights opportunities that already exist for relevant stakeholders to benefit from the Act. It discusses some of the challenges that the Act should address to protect the interests of farmers. The Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights Act of India contains similar provisions, but it formulates protections for researchers as positive rights rather than as exceptions to the rights of plant breeders. The Act also grants researchers the right to use protected varieties as source breeding material for the development of a new variety.
