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It is not one law that draws the line around a seed — breeder's rights, patents, contracts and custom

The four overlap on the same plant, and each of them bites in a different place

Saving seed was, for a very long time, simply part of farming. Yet almost no law writes it down as a right. Where seed saving survives inside the rules today, it survives as an exception — less protected than not yet cut away. So may you sow next year the seed in your hand? No single law decides. A breeder's right protects the variety itself; a patent holds a gene, a trait or a technique; a contract binds whoever receives the seed; and saving seed is a custom. The four overlap on the same plant, and each bites in a different place. The international footing for breeder's rights, the UPOV Convention, was adopted in Paris on 2 December 1961; as of 27 February 2025 it has 80 members. On the first of seven days, what this series hands over is not a conclusion but a ruler for telling the four lines apart.

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