Patenting plant genetics

[seedcorn]

I think we have some confusion as to what is and is not protected.

Anyone can use any naturally occuring genes in any plant. No one or company has exclusive rights to these.

What you can't do.

1) Use patented genetic lines in your breeding program. (Don't get me started about "blow-in" pollen and that farce).
2) Insert genes from another source without passing Government standards from every country in world.
3) If you patent a line, give away, or sell seed you have to be able to support how you bred it--breeder companies use "marker" genes so they can identify/trace their work. So if their marker gene shows up in your line, there is only one way to get it, you stole it.
4) When you buy patented seed, you are only paying for the privelege to plant and harvest results but are not given the right to reproduce for seed or use in breeding.

It's really pretty straight forward and simple. It's just in the past, no one sued anyone for stealing their lines (breeder companies went broke right and left, after spending countless dollars on research only to have every Dick, Tom and Harry steal it) until Dupont (Pioneer) did and won. Rightly so in my opinion.

 

[897tgigvib]

Patenting

wellp, the bazillionaires are gonna do it. What the folks should do is make it so the plant patent is only good for 5 years or so. That's all the time for it to do them any good anyway.

What if Buffalo Bird woman patented all her corn, beans, squash and sunflowers? What if the Indians on the Gaspe penninsula patented their corn before Columbus came?

Howzabout we invent "reverse patents"? All corn varieties go back to the Indians, after all, they developed corn in the first place.

I get a tight gut just thinking about the powers of the bazillionaires, taking, taking, and making sure they take it completely. Want a marker gene the indians developed? the gene that makes a cob of corn. How's that for a marker gene?

 

[nachoqtpie]

If I could like that post... I would... TWICE!

 

[Detlor Poultry]

Patenting

wellp, the bazillionaires are gonna do it. What the folks should do is make it so the plant patent is only good for 5 years or so. That's all the time for it to do them any good anyway.

What if Buffalo Bird woman patented all her corn, beans, squash and sunflowers? What if the Indians on the Gaspe penninsula patented their corn before Columbus came?

Howzabout we invent "reverse patents"? All corn varieties go back to the Indians, after all, they developed corn in the first place.

I get a tight gut just thinking about the powers of the bazillionaires, taking, taking, and making sure they take it completely. Want a marker gene the indians developed? the gene that makes a cob of corn. How's that for a marker gene?

:weight
Good show!


I do have a question for our resident patenting expert;

I read a little about the patenting of plant varieties, and I read that any yet-unpatented non-wildtype gene can be patented. So, my question is: say a gene, like the gene that makes Acorn Squash have red groundcolor, is patented. And there are lots of existing varieties that have that gene which may even be heirloom -- is it automatically illegal to continue to reproduce those plants? It shouldn't be, but knowing the bazillionaires, it probably is.