Seeking solution of rights problem

Press, 22 December 1978, Page 6

Seeking solution of rights problem

There are hopes that a solution may be found to problems which could hold up the release of two new varieties of wheat, Rongotea and Oroua. The Wheat Research Committee has recommended to the DirectorGeneral of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Dr E. I. Robertson, that they should be released, but it was suggested at the time that their release might be held up while their breeder, the Crop Research Division of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. sought the granting of rights over them under the Plant Varieties Act. This enables breeders of new plant varieties to collect royalties for them. A problem is that there is at present no provision for wheat varieties to be handled under the scheme and if seed of a variety is sold for commercial production before an application for rights has been accepted rights may not be granted for the variety, according to information given to the Wheat Research Committee.

The upshot of this dilemma was that last week a deputation from the committee waited on the Minister of Agriculture, Mr Maclntyre, under whose Ministry the plant varieties office works. The ehairman of the committee, Professor R. H. M. Langer, said later that Mr Maclntyre understood that if at all possible the two varieties should be

registered under the plant varieties scheme before they were released. The Minister did not want to see anything held up, he said. But there were difficulties in that at present the scheme did not include wheat and it was also specified that varieties for registration should be

evaluated by the office of the Registrar of Plant Varieties for two years for characteristics like purity and trueness to type. Therefore it was necessary that there should be some changes to the procedures required and; Mr Maclntyre had undertaken to look into this. This might involve a change in the regulations and possibly a slight change to the legislation. Mr Maclntyre had asked

the Registrar of Plant Varieties, Mr T. E. Norris, how this could be done as quickly as possible, so that by the time the committee wanted the new varieties released for sowing next autumn the regulations had either been changed or there was an undertaking that changes were going to be made.

Professor Langer said it had been suggested to the Minister that the two-year evaluation period could be reduced if information gathered by the plant breeders was taken into account.

The possibility was that an application could be made for registration, which would be received, and while the varieties might not have been legally registered as changes to the regulations might not have been completed, it was felt if the application had been made this might be sufficient protection in itself.

However, Professor Langer said it was not only a matter of changing the regulations as additional staff and facilities would be required by the office of the Registrar of Plant Varieties to handle the extra work involved. However, on the other hand, the possibility of obtaining royalties for the varieties from overseas countries, where they might be suitable, was an attractive proposition.

The director of the Crop Research Division, Dr H. C. Smith, has spoken about such royalties being used for promotion of new varieties and also in further plant breeding work.