Created by evolution, claimed by a multinational: the natural pepper plant genes that are now owned by Syngenta

By Pavlos Zafiropoulos

That is the result of a patent granted to the company (full pdf available here) by the European Patent Office (EPO) in May of 2013. The decision, which effectively sets a chilling precedent for the patenting of any number of naturally occurring organisms and/or their genes, is now being challenged by a broad coalition of NGOs who have called the patent unacceptable and believe that it will allow the further concentration of power over the world’s food supply in the hands of a few agribusiness giants.

How the pepper patent came to pass

Pepper crops have a total commercial value of 500 million dollars worldwide per year. However this important agricultural crop grown around the world has a problem: pepper plants are attacked by a number of pests including parasitic insects: namely thrips and whiteflies that can seriously damage the crop.

In the 1970s US researchers discovered one pepper plant that appeared resistant to these bugs – a wild strain of pepper found in Jamaica. In 2002 Syngenta obtained samples of the wild strain from the publicly funded Center for Genetic Resources in the Netherlands and began cross-breeding experiments between the Jamaican strain and conventional pepper varieties.

The goal of these experiments was simple: to obtain a pepper plant that had both the desirable characteristics of conventional pepper plants (high fruit yields, good taste and so on) and the insect resistance of the wild Jamaican strain.

In order to do this the company used selective plant breeding techniques known as SMART breeding. This is a conventional method of breeding plants (ie it does not use artificial genetic modification) supported by technical means to select for specific characteristics.

Effectively by identifying genetic markers (random sequences in the plants’ DNA) associated with the desired characteristics (insect resistance, high yield and so on) the company was able to select offspring of the cross-breeding experiments with all the desired traits.

It should be noted that apart from the added layer of sophistication of the SMART breeding (methods which today are also considered ‘conventional’ – variations of which are performed daily by university, forensics and even school labs the world over) this is no different from what farmers have been doing since the dawn of agriculture: crossing different plant strains to get new strains combining various desirable characteristics.

Yet in 2012 the EPO granted Syngenta a patent for all pepper plants resistant to whiteflies (5 years after the patent application was filed), their seeds and their fruits, which is valid in 38 states across Europe. This effectively means that European farmers and plant breeders are no longer allowed to use the original Jamaican plant type for any further breeding or they will risk violating the patent.

In short, a wild plant strain was just privatized.

The decision by the EPO has caused an intense backlash amid a broad coalition of 34 NGO’s and farmer organisations from 26 of the EU’s member states including Greece alarmed by the precedent it sets. They state categorically that the patent must be revoked as no products of conventional plant breeding should ever be patentable. According to the coalition such a practice is highly dubious ethically and only serves to “aggravate the concentration process within the seed market, have a negative impact on innovation and pose a risk to food security.”

The patent also flies in the face of a 2012 resolution adopted by the European Parliament which “calls on the EPO to exclude from patenting products derived from conventional breeding and all conventional breeding methods.”

Last week the coalition filed an opposition against the patent at the EPO (a pdf summary of the opposition is available here) stating that Syngenta did not invent the resistance since it already existed in nature and novelty cannot be claimed. To mark the opposition representatives staged a protest outside the EPO’s offering free pepper soup to the EPO’s employees.

Given the breadth of support for the call to evoke the patent the EPO may eventually revoke the patent. However it is believed that this process may take years during which time Syngenta will be able to exploit the patent.

Furthermore while the revocation of the pepper-patent would be an important first step, an end to the patenting on life would requie a rule change – either at the EPO level or, more likely, at the level of EU legislation.