ABSTRACT
Chapter 2 of this book aims at drawing a complete picture of the international seed regulatory system that developed during the twentieth century. The objective is to understand the past system to assess the present regulatory setting and suggest ways forward to bring about a future more equitable and effective scheme. The hypothesis framed is that the historical evolution of Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (PGRFA) management has shifted from the consideration that seeds are public goods, freely available to all, to the consideration that seeds are overly privatized goods, accessible to only a few following strict (legal, economic and technical) access conditions. This evolution has crystallized an imbalance of rights pertaining to seeds and contributed to further limiting access to and exchanges of seeds between all stakeholders including farmers, thereby endangering seed conservation and sustainable use. What if seeds were neither exclusively public goods nor private ones? What if this black and white picture was much more nuanced, revealing seeds and their management systems as common goods, expressed in a diversity of collective management systems?
To answer this question, Chapter 2 details the PGRFA international regulatory setting, from the birth of agriculture and its early developments through unfettered access to PGRFA, the rise of modern biotechnology and intellectual property rights crystallizing the appropriation movement to PGRFA. The chapter covers the International Undertaking on Plant Genetic Resources, the Convention on Biological Diversity, the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV, 1991 agreement) and the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights.
