Turning Plant Varieties into Intellectual Property: The UPOV Convention

Abstract

For almost all of human history, farming and crop improvement were carried out by the same people and in the same places, by farmers and indigenous peoples on their own land. The separation of the two activities is very recent, starting in the 19th century. In this chapter I explain what scientific breeders do (see also Chapter 6) and then briefly trace the history of this separation between farming and breeding, which began in Europe and North America, where the first professional breeders emerged, and farmers abandoned or were forced out of breeding as an activity. This separation is an ongoing process in many developing countries and in some areas has hardly even begun.

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