Who controls food supply? The proposed changes for re -use of seeds reopen the debate

This is a small change that cultivates a big debate.

On the one hand, the principle of the privilege of the farmer is – the traditional rights of Canadian farmers to save seeds at the end of the growing season and reuse them next year.

On the other hand, the principle of rights of plant breeders is the rights of those who develop new seeds and plants to protect them from their discoveries and profit.

This issue is inactive for a decade. Now, the proposed changes in government rules about the rights of plant breeders are reviving that debate.

It also raises questions about how Canada gets its food and who controls what is grown.

“Finally, it’s about food security,” said Keith Kari, president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture. The group supports changes that include reducing the scope of the farmer’s privilege. “Not only keeping us competitive to keep the cost of food low, but also to ensure that we maintain new varieties ahead for the availability of that food.”

In a notice Date 9 August, the government announced the proposed changes in the rights regulations of Canada’s plant breeders – a form of intellectual property protection for plants, similar to a patent. Regulations give a monopoly on the distribution of their product for a fixed period to a fixed period, a way that is with high yields or more resistant to dried or insects to encourage investment and innovations.

This is a big business. The economic impact of the seed industry in Canada is estimated from $ 4 billion to $ 6 billion per year.

Right to reuse

Change will remove the rights of farmers and protect seeds and cuttings “will remove fruits, vegetables, decorative varieties, other plants to protect them from reproducing through vegetation and hybrids.” For most of the plants recognized under law, security lasts for 20 years.

Individual gardens and many other types of crops such as wheat, grains and pulses, where the saving of seeds is more broad, will not be affected.

Other proposed changes are currently expanding safety for new varieties of mushrooms, asparagus and woody plants like raspberries and blueberries for 25 years to 25 years.

A public consultation on changes lasts till 18 October.

NDP Agriculture critic Gord Johns says that changes raise an important issue for Canadian people. He questions why the government is consulting in summer when most farmers focus on growing crops and harvesting – not presentations for public consultation.

“They keep doing this repeatedly,” said Johns of the federal government. “They declare regulatory changes that affect farmers and their livelihood (and), determine the time of consultation period for farmers during the busiest time of the year.”

Johns said that companies producing new types of seeds should be compensated adequately for their innovation and intellectual property. But he said that farmers who grow and canadian eaters have eaten, “should not be hungry by big corporations who shut down their seed supply.”

He wants the House of Commons Agriculture Committee to hear and take a close look at the changes being proposed.

A spokesperson of the Agriculture Minister and Agriculture-Bhojan Heath McDonald said that the government is “committed to encouraging innovation, investment, research and competition in Canadian agriculture, horticulture and decorative industries.”

The spokesman said that the government would review all the response before determining the next stages “.

Access vs innovation

Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government started a debate in 2015 when it adopted measures to bring more Canada rules, in line with the guidelines adopted by the International Union to conserve new varieties of plants, known as UPOV 91.

Rules are different from patent laws or technology use agreements that some seed companies use to prevent farmers from saving and reusing seeds.

Changes in the rules of plant breeders are now on the table again. Last year, a government consultation resulted in 109 presentations, supporting most changes.

Meanwhile, the lobists are busy behind the curtain.

According to the Federal Lobbing Registry, 13 people from many different groups or companies are currently registered to advocate the rights of a Chinese state-owned entrepreneurship with a Chinese state-owned entrepreneurship, which are registered to advocate the rights of a Chinese state-owner, including the Cancer Federation of Agriculture, Canadian Canoe Grover Association, Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association and Swiss-based Sinjenta, a Chinese state-owner. Are in

Kathy Holtslander, director of Research and Policy for the National Farmers Union, says the proposed changes harm farmers, while multinational companies with increase in profits and power-producing companies with power-often foreign ownership.

While changes are focused on an area of agriculture where seeds are less common, Holtslander has warned that changes are a “slippery slope” that can err farmers’ rights.

“If they wanted to go after wheat with amendment, there would be a huge uproar and people would really be angry and push back,” said Holtslander.

He said that “route paved” for other crops to join later.

“The seed industry does not want the privilege of farmers to be present for any seed. They want people to be able to buy new seeds every year,” he said.

The group of Holtslander plans to fight the proposed changes. He said that this issue is beyond the question of individual farmers who reuse seeds.

“If large multinational companies control seeds, they control our food supply,” he said.

Lauren Comin, director of the policy for Seeds Canada, admitted that the issue could be controversial, but argued that Canada needs strong intellectual property protection if he wants to reach the latest innovations to compete on the world stage.

Comin said, “It is incredibly important to have these outlines to encourage investment companies, businesses, public institutions, to find out that they are going to be compensation and preserved somehow,” Comin said.

She said that while changes “provide encouragement for that certainty and investment,” she wants them to move forward.

Accepting that not all Canada’s grains and small grain crops are sufficiently certified seeds, comments will also prefer farmers to compensate the breeders of plants when they reuse the seeds, as they do in Europe.

“The privilege of the farmer does not say that this use is free,” he said.

“(Farmers) can choose to buy the latest and largest product of innovation, meaning that there is a tremendous amount of investment and effort that has gone towards developing this better diversity. Or they can decide that they do not give importance to innovation, and they can go back to a variety that is unsafe and can increase it.”

Curry, an Ontario grain and oil seed farmer who saves and reuses the seed, says Canada needs to balance two principles.

He says that the privilege of the farmer is important for Canada’s competition, but therefore access to new varieties of seeds and plants.

“When I think some multinational companies want to have better control, I believe that to be viable for the industry, farmers must also have some control,” he said.