The modern seed debate is a legal, economic and ecological struggle over the ownership of life.
Vandana Shiva and a network of independent analysts frame the modern seed debate as a legal, economic and ecological struggle over the ownership of life. They argue that a series of legal decisions, trade rules and corporate mergers converted seeds from a commons into private property. That conversion imposed a new legal regime on farmers, introduced recurring royalty payments, and placed control of genetic traits and seed supply chains in the hands of a shrinking number of multinational firms. The argument rests first on a legal fact: patent regimes and trade agreements made new forms of life eligible for private monopoly protection. The WTO’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights explicitly opened the door to patents in biological fields and required members to review certain protections four years after the agreement’s coming into force. The plain text of the TRIPS agreement shows how patentability of biotechnological inventions became a global standard rather than a regional anomaly.
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