As a signatory of Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement of 1995, the Protection of Plant Variety & Farmers’ Right Act, 2001 was enacted for the protection of plant varieties and rights of farmers and therefore, explicitly recognize the farmers’ role as conserver. To achieve the said objectives, exclusive nine rights were granted to farmers termed as Farmers’ Rights. A National Gene Fund has been constituted to fund the conservation activities through small project grants, which can be implemented by Biodiversity Management Committees, cash rewards and recognitions on annual basis. So far, 10 farming communities and 25 individual farmers have been recognized for their contribution in conservation, improvement and preservation of useful germplasm and biodiversity conservation as a whole. Further, to document the traditional varieties, registration of farmers’ varieties is also being done by the PPV&FR Authority and a total of 1,460 applications have been received so far.
Farmers’ Rights, Plant genetic resources (PGR), Plant Varieties, Protection
