Legal Protection of New Plant Varieties in China and Russia

The People’s Republic of China and the Russian Federation are signatories to the 1961 International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants. This necessitates harmonization of legislation in relevant areas, though the legal system of each state exhibits its own characteristics and challenges. With the advancement of China’s agricultural modernization strategy, rights to new plant varieties, serving as a crucial legal safeguard for agricultural scientific and technological achievements, have become a key component of the national intellectual property system. The paper outlines the development of a system for the protection of new plant varieties in China, analyzes the main achievements and shortcomings of protection measures, pays special attention to the validity of restrictions on rights and legal conflicts of interests of farmers, and considers the possibility of expanding the scope of protection in China in the future. Currently, the system of protecting the rights to new plant varieties in China remains in conflict between the promotion and protection of innovations in plant breeding and the maintenance of public interests. In this regard, the development of China’s legal protection system for new plant varieties may involve improving legislation, clearly defining the boundaries of rights, and strengthening judicial oversight, thereby providing legal support for building a high-quality seed industry system and developing new productive forces. In the legal system of the Russian Federation, issues concerning the protection of new plant varieties include insufficient elaboration of the royalty collection model in legislation, imperfections in the methodology for conducting new variety trials, among others.

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