The intellectual property rights of plant varieties in Mexico

This essay examines, within the context of the process of international homogenization of intellectual property rights, the changes in plant variety intellectual property rights that have occurred during the last two decades in Mexico. It is sustained that mexican legislation has stimulated the exclusion of small or medium size, local or regional seed enterprises, by using a biased norm, through the use of UPOV (of the International Union for the Protection of Vegetable Obtentions) type protocols, and it is argued that public institution involved in plant breeding, should adopt a defined position with respect to intelectual property. Team work and inter-institutional relations should be strengthened.