Seeds are the bedrock of any country’s agriculture, however, the fear of exploitation, fake seeds and GMO seeds have kept most farmers and seeds producers from exploring the potential of the recently signed PVP law in Nigeria, JOHN OBA writes.
The centrality of quality seeds to the development in agriculture Nigeria cannot be over emphasised, hence the government’s effort at encouraging seed breeders’ production of quality seeds.
But over the years, lack of incentives for both private seeds breeders and government research institutions have almost stalled production of such quality seeds that council be beneficial to farmers.
Various studies have shown that one of the major reasons for poor agricultural performance in Nigeria and across Africa is the lack of substantial progress in improving the performance of available plant varieties.
According to reports, despite the plethora of commitment and effort by various governments to improve agricultural productivity, crop yields in Nigeria have remained one of the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa, hence the called for the adoption of improved seed varieties as a necessary and cost-effective means of improving productivity, quality, and marketability.
Seeds breeding
Experts in the industry explained that breeding new varieties of plants requires a substantial investment of skills, labour, material resources, money, and time, it can take more than 15 years to bring a new variety to the market. This was why experts hailed President Muhammadu Buhari signing of the Plant Variety Protection (PVP) Bill (PVP Act 2021) into law.
PVP law
The protection of the right of plant breeders is an important stimulus for the development of better plant varieties. The intellectual property right on a variety gives a breeder the exclusive rights to decide how to exploit and release this innovation in the most appropriate way.
Speaking on the importance of the PVP law, the Nigeria PVP desk office, and technical Assistant, to the Director General, National Agricultural Seeds Council (NASC), Dr Folarin Okelola, said PVP, if well applied, the plant Variety Protection System can be an important tool to encourage the creation and release of new varieties of plants, ensuring and improving access to innovation, technology transfer, food security and genetic diversity.
“Plant Variety protection (PVP) is therefore afforded to plant breeders as an incentive for the development of new varieties to contribute to sustainable progress in agriculture, horticulture, and forestry.”
Training stakeholders
As part of effort to encourage stakeholders to adoption of the PVP system, the National Agricultural Seeds Council (NASC) commenced national training of stakeholders and awareness creation on Plant Variety Protection (PVP) system Nigeria for better understanding of the importance of the PVP system on seed variety and seed business and variety development.
The Council brought over 50 stakeholders in the seeds industry together in Abuja for a three-day sensitisation training for a better understanding of the PVP System in compliance with UPOV convention, better understanding of the method of DUS testing; method of Test Guidelines composition while sharing experiences and successful models applicable in West Africa.
The participants are expected to understand the pathway for successful Plant Variety Protection System and ensure a knowledge base created to facilitating the introduction and practical implementation of Plant variety Protection and Plant Breeder Rights in target countries and country action plans drafted.
While declaring the National Training and Awareness Creation on Plant Variety Protection(PVP) System in Nigeria open on Wednesday, the Director General, NASC, Dr. Olusegun Philips Ojo, said the role of plant variety protection (PVP) in responding to the challenge of seeds breeding is to provide a legal framework and system that encourages plant breeding leading to the development of superior plant varieties with high yield potentials and capable of withstanding conditions resulting from climate change and global population growth.
He said it is important to note that Nigeria was one of the few countries in Africa with no legal framework for the protection of Plant Breeders. Studies in Kenya, Morocco, Tunisia, and South Africa among others have shown the importance of having such legal framework in place.
According to him, PVP law will increase investment in plant breeding, enhance development of new plant varieties capable of increasing yield and productivity for our smallholder farmer requires huge investment.
“Breeders must be encouraged to invest in research and development (R&D) leading to desired innovation, increase in the number of Breeders and Breeding entities, access to foreign trade in varieties, increased availability of more improved crop varieties with better yield potentials, high stress tolerance and disease resistance with high input efficiency etc, employment generation, income, and knowledge, access to foreign varieties and enhanced domestic breeding programs.
“It is against this background that the NASC under the Leadership of the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development and with the support of our partners, locally and internationally since 2017 commenced effort towards the introduction and enactment of a PVP Law for Nigeria and subsequently Nigeria’s membership of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plant (UPOV) to enable Nigeria benefit from international Seed trade.
“The first phase of having a legal instrument we have achieved, we are now making concerted efforts towards Nigeria full membership of UPOV, and we are hopeful, that very soon this would be achieved too,” he assured.
Ojo said that crop yields in Nigeria have remained one of the lowest in Africa due to a lack of substantial progress in improving the performance of available plant varieties.
He posited that improved varieties are necessary and cost-effective means of improving productivity, quality and marketability of crops.
He expressed optimism that Nigeria would soon become a member of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) which would enable Nigeria to benefit from International Seed Trade.
Also speaking, Mariska Lammers, First Secretary, Food Security and Climate, Netherlands Embassy in Nigeria, stressed the importance of PVP law, adding that PVP enables plant breeders and investors to reap from their investments.
She said focus will be put on the PAIRED targeted countries and or countries that have recently developed a plant variety protection law, or those that are currently in the process of developing such legislation, will be given priority.
The participants were introduced to the legal framework, requirements of the international Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) and the relationship between UPOV and Genetic resources management; institutional aspects, procedures and administration, organizational setup, variety registration systems, collaboration and testing; technical aspects, the principle of Distinctness; uniformity and Stability (DUS), UPOV Test Guidelines, data analysis, reporting, variety denomination; exploitation of plant breeders’ rights – enforcing rights, royalty collection, farm saved seed among many others.
NASC PVP Office and other public organizations presently working in the field of the Plant Variety Protection (PVP); examination, growing test, test guidelines elaboration, legal departments in the agricultural industry, etc. in west Africa francophone countries.
