Plant Varieties

The firm assists clients operating as growers in sectors such as horticultural food production and floriculture, advising them on the development and exploitation of rights relating to new plant varieties.

The legal instrument for the protection of plant varieties is known as a plant breeder’s right (PBR), a new plant variety right or a plant variety right (PVR).

A plant variety right is a specific form of industrial property right recognised in several countries around the world. Its purpose is to encourage the development of new varieties by granting commercial exclusivity, thereby enabling the breeder to recover their investment costs and benefit from the commercial exploitation of protected varieties.

The term “plant variety” refers to a plant grouping within a single botanical taxon of the lowest known rank. To qualify for the grant of a plant variety right, a new plant variety must satisfy the requirements of novelty, distinctness, uniformity and stability.

A plant variety is considered “new” if, on the filing date of the application for protection, propagating or vegetative propagating material, or harvested material of the variety, has not been sold or otherwise disposed of to third parties by or with the consent of the breeder, for the purpose of exploiting the variety, for more than one year within the national territory or for more than four years in any foreign country. The latter period is extended to six years in the case of trees and vines.

A plant variety satisfies the requirement of “distinctness” if it is clearly distinguishable from any other variety whose existence is a matter of common knowledge on the filing date of the application. The variety is considered “uniform” if it is sufficiently uniform in the expression of the distinguishing characteristics relevant for the purposes of protection. Finally, the variety is considered “stable” if those distinguishing characteristics remain unchanged after successive propagations.