A sustainable way forward for public plant breeding

How can public plant breeding programs reap royalties and research investments while keeping their cultivars in the public domain?

Good question. For some answers, see the proceedings on the 2016 Intellectual Property Rights for Public Plant Breeding Summit, released yesterday by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s College of Agricultural and Life Sciences.

Here’s the organizer, Bill Tracy:

For many years now, we have heard how public plant breeding has been on the decline. What was exciting about this meeting is that we heard real world solutions implemented by colleges and technology transfer agencies that not only support current cultivar development but have increased the number of plant breeders, crop varieties released, and royalties generated.

In an era of continuing consolidation on the private side, it’s good to see public sector plant breeding making a stand.