Signposts To Sui Generis Rights: Resource materials from the international seminar on sui generis rights

TRIPS requires developing countries to enact intellectual property rights (IPR) legislation for plant varieties by the year 2000, while least-developed countries have until 2005. This can be in the form of classic industrial patent systems or some "effective sui generis system". Most people speculate that this novel sui generis option means Plant Variety Protection -- a soft patent system for seeds. PVP is widely criticised by NGOs and scientists for promoting the loss of biodiversity on farms and a global concentration of the food system under the control of a few transnational corporations. Others have been racking their brains to figure out whether and how this sui generis option could be used to enact Farmers' Rights or some other sui generis legal system to protect communities' intellectual rights and promote continued management biodiversity at the grassroots level. How open- ended is this new sui generis option? What can be achieved through it? What proposals could developing countries make to win the most for their farmers, traditional healers and other rural communities when the Agreement is renegotiated in 1999? [author]

Based on materials prepared for a conference in Thailand