Chairman of the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers' Rights Authority (PPV&FRA) B. Rajender has said, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh States are lagging behind in registering for their intellectual property rights on plant (crop) varieties, either improved or newly developed, and there is need to create awareness among farmers on the issue.
The Union Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare had decided to set up the regional office of PPV&FRA here, to encourage the community participation in registering more farmers varieties of plants in and to protect their rights on such indigenous varieties in the two Telugu States.
This was announced by Mr. Rajender, who is also the Joint Secretary (Seeds) in the Ministry, while speaking at the Regional Workshop on Farmers' Rights and Agri-Biodiversity Exhibition held on the campus of Professor Jayashankar Telangana State Agricultural University (PJTSAU) here on Saturday.
He stated that to encourage community participation in registering farmers crop varieties, the PPV&FR Authority is giving cash incentives. The incentive would be ₹10 lakh to the communities for propagating awareness on farmers rights in a particular area, and ₹1.5 lakh to individual farmers who show interest to register crop varieties developed by them in their fields.
Asking the scientists of agriculture and horticulture universities to encourage farmers to register their crop varieties under PPV&FRA, Agriculture Production Commissioner of Telangana C. Parthasarathi stressed the need to create awareness on it among the farmers through vigorous campaigns in villages. He also suggested the agriculture department officials to educate farmers on their intellectual property rights.
The need to start a separate knowledge portal on how to register plant varieties and characteristics of varieties, application forms and procedures, highlighted by Vice-Chancellor of PJTSAU V. Praveen Rao. He suggested that, it should also be updated frequently on the varieties registered in other States as well.
Source:http://www.thehindu.com/
