A patent register is composed that, except for patents on plant varieties as such, contains all patents of the members that block the use of biological material for breeding vegetable varieties and all patents of the members that block the commercialisation of such new vegetable varieties.

The members of the ILP Vegetable will make all of these patents accessible to their fellow members under the conditions of the ILP Vegetable, i.e. at fair and reasonable costs.

The latest version of the Patent Register can be downloaded here.

The ILP Vegetable also covers patents on plant varieties as such. Such patents are granted for example in the US and these are described in the ILP Vegetable documents as ‘Variety patents’. For these variety patents, the members have agreed not to exert their rights against another member if that member uses the protected variety to develop another variety. The non-assert also extends to commercialisation of new varieties that are developed by using the protected variety. This means that such new varieties may be freely commercialised provided that the new variety is sufficiently different from the existing variety; members are not expected to simply ‘copy’ the patented variety. Further the member using this non-assert, needs to notify the patent holder.