June 19, 2015

The Community Plant Variety Office is organizing on 24 June 2015 a seminar on the interface between plant variety rights and patents in Brussels.

“The recent Broccoli and Tomato cases from the Enlarged Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office address to what extent patents can be granted to plant related innovations. This seminar is very topical and will allow experts in the field to digest and debate recent developments” stated Martin Ekvad, the President of the CPVO.

The CPVO Vice-President, Carlos Godinho, explained that “the purpose of this event is to address questions raised by the role of different systems of intellectual property rights in the field of plant varieties and plant biotechnology – analyzing their respective scope of protection and exceptions to that scope with a view to increasing understanding of this area.”

The agenda of the seminar includes the following topics:

• patenting plant material under the European Patent Convention and the Biotech Directive;
• the European Patent system and the Unitary Patent system;
• the Directive on Biotechnological inventions;
• farmers’ views on patent protected material;
• the International License Platform (ILP);
• the Pinto database;
• several Member State perspectives and expert discussions on the co-existence between plant variety rights and patents.

The audience is limited to the members of the Administrative Council of the CPVO and observers and to some experts from national patent offices in the EU Member States. About 90 participants are expected to attend. Speakers come from the CPVO and its Board of Appeal, the European Patent Office, Member States, the European Commission, COPA-COGECA, the European Seed Association, the International Licensing Platform and universities.

Website: http://www.cpvo.europa.eu

Published: June 23, 2015