Responsibilities of ministries for the protection of rights to plant varieties in Vietnam

According to Article 4 of Decree No. 88/2010/NĐ-CP of Vietnam’s Government, responsibilities of ministries and ministerial-level agencies for the protection of rights to plant varieties are specified as follows:

- The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development shall perform the stale management of the protection of rights to plant varieties nationwide and have the following responsibilities:

+ To submit to competent authorities for promulgation or to promulgate according to its competence legal documents on the protection of rights to plant varieties and organize the implementation;

+ To grant, re-grant, withdraw, invalidate or cancel plant variety protection certificates;

+ To promulgate a list of protected plant varieties; processes and procedures of technical tests of plant varieties;

+ To define the organization, functions, tasks and powers of the plant variety protection agency; to designate and manage the operation of organizations and individuals conducting technical tests of plant varieties;

+ To disseminate and educate about the law on protection of rights to plant varieties;

+ To examine, inspect and handle administrative violations in the protection of rights to plant varieties:

+ To undertake international cooperation on the protection of rights to plant varieties;

+ To manage activities of representing rights to plant varieties; to accredit and expunge rights-to-plant varieties representation service providers; to grant and withdraw- rights-to-plant varieties representation practice certificates;

+ To provide information and make statistics on the protection of rights to plant varieties;

+ To issue forms on the protection of rights to plant varieties.

- The Ministry of Finance shall assume the prime responsibility for. and coordinate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in. guiding the collection, management and use of charges and fees for the protection of rights to plant varieties.

- The Ministry of Science and Technology and other ministries, ministerial-level agencies and government-attached agencies shall, within the scope of their assigned tasks and powers, coordinate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in performing the state management of the protection of rights to plant varieties.

View more details at Decree No. 88/2010/NĐ-CP of Vietnam’s Government, effective from October 01, 2010.

Nguyen Phu

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