Section 2a: Farm-saved seed

By way of derogation from Article L. 623-4, for the species listed in Council Regulation (EC) No 2100/94 of 27 July 1994 on Community plant variety rights and for other species that may be listed by decree, farmers have the right to use on their own holdings, without the breeder’s authorisation, for the purposes of reproduction or multiplication, the product of the harvest that they have obtained by planting a…

Except in the case of small farmers within the meaning of Council Regulation (EC) No 2100/94 of 27 July 1994 referred to above, the farmer shall pay compensation to the holders of the plant variety certificates whose varieties he uses. .

Where there is no contract between the plant variety certificate holder and the farmer concerned or between one or more plant variety certificate holders and a group of farmers concerned, or no inter-branch agreement concluded under the conditions laid down in Chapter II of Title III of Book VI of the Rural and Maritime Fishing Code, the conditions for applying the derogation defined in l’article L. 623-24-1of this code, including…

When farmers use service providers to sort their seeds, these sorting operations must be carried out under conditions that guarantee the traceability of products from varieties covered by plant variety certificates. If these conditions are not complied with, the seed is deemed to have been marketed and is considered to be an infringement within the meaning of article L. 623-25.

Failure by farmers to comply with the conditions for application of the derogation defined in article L. 623-24-1 shall cause them to lose the benefit of the provisions of this section.