Food Security and Plant Variety Protection: Seeding Hope for the African Continental Free Trade Area?

This article argues that the twin pillars of the right to food and sustainable development ought to inform how the Annex on the protection of new plant varieties under the Agreement establishing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is drafted, in view of the impact of such protection on access to food. Such impact is multi-pronged, beginning with the quality, quantity and availability of seeds, through to crop production and regional cross-border distribution of agricultural products in the AfCFTA. In order to give effect to these twin pillars, the continental sui generis system mandated by the AfCFTA Protocol on Intellectual Property Rights must draw on access and benefit sharing rules, farmers rights and existing plant variety protection systems. The article posits that this is an opportune moment to return to the African Union Model Law for the Protection of the Rights of Local Communities, Farmers and Breeders, and for the Regulation of Access to Biological Resources and various instruments of the regional economic communities and intellectual property organizations to weave the continental system in the Annex on Plant Variety Protection to be negotiated under the Protocol.