A pedigreed seed grower from Delisle, Sask., has agreed to pay restitution of $120,000 following the illegal sale of pedigreed seed protected by plant breeders’ rights.
SeCan Association officials confirmed Oct. 9 that a resolution has been reached in a legal action against Leonard Junop and Junop Bros. Seed of Delisle.
The case involved the illegal sale of two PBR protected malt barley varieties: AC Metcalfe and CDC Copeland.
Lorne Hadley, executive director of the Canadian Plant Technology Agency, said “a significant amount” of protected barley seed was sold over two or three years.
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“Essentially, they were seed growers who were no longer members of the SeCan Association and they continued to sell SeCan varieties, and of course that’s not permitted,” Hadley said. “We want seed to be sold and we want royalties from seed sales to return to plant breeders so they can do more plant breeding…. In a case like this, there was no royalty … being returned to the plant breeder at all.”
The resolution included an agreement to stop selling SeCan’s protected varieties and make a cash payment of $120,000 to cover financial damages and pay royalties owed to the respective breeding institutions.
Hadley said most PBR infringements do not involve significant volumes of seed and are not viewed as deliberate attempts to sidestep PBR protections.
“Our (CPTA’s) role is really to educate producers and the industry on what PBR means … to monitor the marketplace for infringements and if necessary … to manage the kinds of infringement actions that took place in the Junop case,” Hadley said.
“Cases this size are pretty rare.… Most of the time, when you run across an infringement, it involves a (commercial) producer and they’re doing it through error.”
Most infringements are resolved outside the court system.
Todd Hyra, western Canadian business manager for SeCan, said protecting intellectual property helps ensure breeding institutions continue to invest in breeding activities.
“In order for Canadian agriculture to remain competitive, we must continue to support the brightest re-search scientists and expand our ability to deliver cutting-edge varieties and traits.”
Hyra said farmer attitudes toward intellectual property protections have come a long way in the past few years.
“I think probably the most interesting shift has been the mindset of producers … in terms of the need to ensure that Canada is an attractive place (for plant breeders) to invest,” he said.
PBR regulations allow grain producers to save their own seed for replanting on their own farms or sale into the commercial grain handling system.
However, commercial growers are not allowed to sell the seed to other growers for reproduction.
