Food security and intellectual property rights: Finding the linkages

There is no easy way to identify the policy, economic and legal linkages between food security as a goal and intellectual property rights (IPRs) as an instrument to promote and enhance human creativity and overall social well-being. But connections do exist. Food security is part of the basic human right to food, broadly defined as timely access to sufficient and nutritious food. It is inextricably linked to the right to health, discussed in an earlier chapter. It is linked to intellectual property (IP) inasmuch as plant variety protection (PVP; also known as plant breeders’ rights) and patents, as applied to genetic resources, biodiversity components and biotechnological processes, may be limiting the possibilities of cultivators to freely grow certain crops, and of people to consume resulting agricultural products.