General features of plant variety rights information searching

While within a particular country plant variety rights are often readily searchable by examiners and the public, it may be of benefit to breeders and producers to be able to search the rights issued by other countries.
Thus, for example, it would be of value to have the data internationally and searchably available, e.g. on a website such as the Patent Lens, for various national sui generis systems and for the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV),⁶⁵ which was established by the International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants adopted in Paris in 1961 and revised in 1972, 1978 and 1991.

The main reasons this enlargement of the data available would be desirable are similar to those outlined for patent information in earlier chapters of this paper.  Plant-derived products from one country that are subject to plant variety protection in other countries may be subject to impoundment when imported into these countries.  With the standardization afforded by TRIPS, many multinationals are becoming increasingly active about protecting their PVR rights by this mechanism.⁶⁶

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_{⁶⁵http://www.upov.int/
⁶⁶van Wijk AJP, Louwaars NP and Eaton DJF (2004)  Framework for the Introduction of Plant Variety Protection in Developing Countries. Centre for Genetic Resources, Wageningen.}

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