Abstract

PLANT BREEDERS RIGHTS AND FARMERS RIGHTS IN WTO FRAMEWORK: CHANGES IN SEED POLICIES AND LEGAL FRAME WORK IN INDIA

Dr Pulapalli Venkataramana

Volume: 7 Issue: 3 2017

Abstract:

The Government of India declared seeds as an essential commodity under the Essential Commodities Act, 1955. The Indian Seed Act, 1966 provided a general policy and institutional framework for supply of seeds to agriculture. The basis objective of the Act is to regulate the quality of seeds and notify various varieties of seeds by the central government with clear certification. At the state level, various State Seed Certification agencies are authorised with rigorous seed standards through complex field inspections and laboratory testing. Thus the seed production and supervision had been mostly done by the public sector. There could also be private sector seed companies earlier with insignificant role. Hence, the government of India has brought out a penalty provision under the Essential Commodities Act. Under clause 'BC Accordingly, Seed Control Order 1983 was promulgated and that came into effect from July 1, 1994 after prolonged legal challenges by seed dealers associations. In accordance with the provisions of the Seed Act 1966, Central Variety Release Committee (CVRC) is to be constituted for approval of seed varieties and cultivars. Inspite of these measures, there had been persistent shortage of seed varieties resulting in dearth of food grains in the country during 1960s. This has forced the government to adopt the New Agricultural Strategy (NAS) with High Yielding Varieties of Seeds. As a part of this strategy, production and distribution of seed varieties were undertaken by the public sector. Thus the public sector seed industry was the major player which undertook breeding and multiplication. During the early decades, the presence of private sector was negligible.

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