Can IPR be a Strategy for Benefits Flowing from Public Plant Breeding in Developing Countries?.

Not-for-profit CGIAR organizations typically develop and freely share advanced lines and other crop breeding materials as global public goods, and depend on national partnerships with both public and private organizations to achieve meaningful farm-level impacts.   What could be the role of intellectual property rights (IPRs)—that is, time-limited mechanisms to privately appropriate knowledge-- in plant breeding programs aimed at fostering food security, particularly in developing countries?  Because impact on the farmer fields depends on commercialization of prospective varieties, both public and private organizations may use plant variety protection rights, patents, trademarks, and combinations of the former, as means to ensure that improved varieties get to the target users and beneficiaries.  Differences between the sectors tend to lie in their target beneficiaries, and in the reasons and ways to use IPRs.  For example, where a public organization may seek to benefit small to medium scale farmers in developing countries, as well as to foster a local or national small to medium seed industry, IPR on crop materials can be used to help make that possible.  IPR plans can be structured such that further public research is secured while intended beneficiaries are reached in the scale and speed and with the quality desired. CGIAR public partners and collaborators use IPR for different crops with varied commercialization scales, to facilitate the diffusion and deployment of crop breeding products in developing countries.