Michael Jarvis (202) 720-8998michael.jarvis@ams.usda.gov
WASHINGTON, Oct. 12, 2010 – The U.S. Department of Agriculture has issued certificates of protection to developers of 12 new varieties of seed-reproduced and tuber-propagated plants. They include bluegrass, fescue, safflower and sunflower.
The Plant Variety Protection Act provides legal protection in the form of intellectual property rights to developers of new varieties of plants.
“A certificate of protection is awarded to an owner of a crop variety after an examination shows that it is new, distinct from other varieties, and genetically uniform and stable through successive generations,” said Administrator Rayne Pegg, Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS). “The public benefits as the recipient of lower prices from increased productivity, and from quality food, feed, fiber and other products, that result directly from improved plant varieties.”
The term of protection is 20 years for most crops, and 25 years for trees, shrubs and vines. The owner of a protected variety has exclusive rights to multiply and market the seed of that variety.
The 12 certificates are:
-- the Wildhorse variety of Kentucky bluegrass, developed by Blue Mt. Seeds, Inc. and Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, Imbler, Ore.;
-- the Winter Blue variety of Kentucky bluegrass, developed by Pure-Seed Testing, Inc., Hubbard, Ore.;
-- the Greystone II and LS 1010 varieties of tall fescue, developed by NexGen Turf Research, LLC, Albany, Ore.;
-- the S-325* variety of safflower, developed by California Oils Corporation, Woodland, Calif.;
-- the Tulsa Time variety of tall fescue, developed by NexGen Turf Research, LLC, Albany, Ore.;
-- the CW 3268-OL variety of safflower, developed by Cal/West Seeds, Woodland, Calif.; and
-- the R89DMR, R110DMR, OB724, IR157DMR, IOB1178DMR, varieties of sunflower, developed by NIDERA S.A., Buenos Aires, Argentina.
* In the United States, seed of this variety shall be sold by variety name only as a class of certified seed and shall conform to the number of generations specified by the owner of the rights (84 STAT. 1542, as amended, 7 U.S.C. 2321 ET SEQ).
USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service administers the Plant Variety Protection Act, which provides time-limited marketing protection to developers of new and distinct seed-reproduced and tuber-propagated plants ranging from farm crops to flowers.
For more information, contact the Plant Variety Protection Office at (301) 504-5518, fax (301) 504-5291, or the Internet at www.ams.usda.gov./pvpo.
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