International Seed Treaty

Theme: Celebrating Guardians of Crop Diversity: towards an inclusive Global Biodiversity Framework

Subject: Environment

Context:

India hosted 9th session of Governing Body meeting (GB-9) of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA)

About ITPGRFA:

It is a major international agreement to conserve, use and manage plant genetic resources for food and agriculture (PGRFA).
Background: signed in 2001 in Madrid, and entered into force on June 29, 2004.
Members: 148 total (147 countries and1 inter-governmental organisation- EU).

Significance:

Guarantees food security through the conservation, exchange and sustainable use of the world’s PGRFA.
The fair and equitable benefit sharing arising from use of PGRFA
Recognition of farmers’ rights.
The Treaty ensures that farmers and plant breeders easily access the raw genetic material needed to develop new crop varieties for
Higher yields
Resilience to climate change.
It works in harmony with the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

Key terms associated with the Treaty:

Digital Sequence Information (DSI)
Refer to data derived from genetic resources such as nucleic acid sequence data and protein sequence data.
DSI is an important concept in international legally binding instruments with access and benefit-sharing obligations such as CBD, Antarctic Treaty System, Pandemic Influenza Preparedness Framework etc.
Multilateral System on Access and Benefit-sharing mechanism (MLS)
On joining the International Treaty, countries agree to make their genetic diversity and related information about the crops stored in their public gene banks available to all through the Multilateral System (MLS).
This mechanism offers scientific institutions, farmers, plant breeders and the private sector the opportunity to work with, and potentially improve, the materials stored in gene banks or used in breeding programmes without having to negotiate contracts with individual gene banks.
It includes 64 of the world’s most important crops. These are crops that together account for 80 percent of all human consumption derived from plants.