Fighting crime in the seed business.
The Anti-Infringement Bureau for Intellectual Property Rights on Plant Material (AIB) is a non-profit association that protects the Intellectual Property Rights of 15 member seed companies. It was established in 2010, and is based in Brussels, Belgium. The main mission of AIB is awareness creation for IPR in the vegetable seed sector and the enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights violations, to include violations of Plant Variety Protection (PVP) and Plant Breeders’ Rights (PBR).
AIB has conducted a wide variety of actions and operations against PVP and PBR infringers since its inception in 2010. AIB is the first organization in the vegetable seed industry to conduct these types of investigations and operations against infringers.
While this process has been difficult and time consuming, AIB has begun to see excellent results from these actions. For example, in November of 2019 an infringer was condemned to one year imprisonment and a 15K euro fine for illegally reproducing, with the use of prohibited techniques, a protected variety tomato plant. The infringer was also ordered to pay 50k euro in civil damages to the affected vegetable seed company and 20K euro to AIB.
Another relevant ruling occurred in January of 2022 where two infringers were found guilty of having illegally reproduced tomato plants of a variety protected by PBR. These infringers were sentenced to eight months imprisonment and a fine of 10,000 euros each. The infringers were also required to pay damages and fees totalling 100,000 euros to both AIB and to the company that owns the Plant Breeders’ Rights on the tomato variety.
AIB has recently begun to expand our actions to include contacts and groups outside of the Ministry of Agriculture sphere of influence with great success. AIB has initiated training and has engaged in cooperative activities with several police and military organizations to attack infringement issues via criminal violations. We have had great success in pursuing criminal investigations against infringers for crimes outside of the PVP and PBR infringements. These crimes are often linked to the infringement actions committed by our usual targets and include such crimes as tax evasion, fraud, counterfeiting or worker exploitation. These criminal violations are easier to understand by the police and criminal investigators, as opposed to PVP and PBR infringements. The criminal charges also have more serious penalties, to include significant jail sentences, asset forfeiture possibilities, and stiffer fines.
As an example, AIB has developed and encouraged cooperation and operations with several Italian police agencies. Historically AIB has worked within the Ministry of Agriculture system, to include actions worked in tandem with the ‘Il Dipartimento dell’Ispettorato centrale della tutela della qualità e repressione frodi dei prodotti agroalimentari (ICQRF)’ and the Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA). AIB has now expanded our relationships and actions to include working with the ‘Guardia di Finanza’, and the ‘Carabinieri Forestali’. AIB has signed a formal cooperation protocol with these agencies and has initiated actions and operations in conjunction with these groups to include regular training and educational opportunities.
AIB has also reached out to the international police organizations, Interpol, and Europol, to combat PVP and PBR infringements. Since 2011 Interpol and Europol have conducted a joint operation, Operation OPSON, that has targeted adulterated and substandard food. AIB has joined in this operation to promote actions against those who would infringe on vegetable seeds. AIB has assisted Interpol/Europol with training and planning for this operation the last several years. In 2019 the former Managing Director of AIB conducted a presentation about PVP and PBR infringements and sat as part of a panel at the 2019 International Law Enforcement Intellectual Property Crime Conference for Interpol.
AIB has also teamed up with the Interpol Intellectual Property Crime Investigators College (IIPCIC) to develop an e-learning module, “Understanding and Addressing Infringement in the Vegetable Seeds Sector”. This e-learning opportunity is a self-administered module, approximately one hour long, that breaks down the investigative process for a PVP or PBR infringement. This module is available for free for all police/government officials via Interpol and is available for a charge for all private sector actors. AIB covers the cost of the module for our members and other pertinent actors.
AIB has taken the fight against PVP and PBR infringers to the next logical step by treating these violations as the crime that they are. By using the existing criminal statutes to target the organized crime groups and immoral farmers, growers, and breeders, who illegally infringe on the PVPs and PBRs, AIB hopes to weed out those who would compromise the vegetable seed industry. AIB wants all vegetable seed companies, farmers, growers and breeders to work together to police the industry and to provide for a level playing field for all players.
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