Plant Varieties

Plant Variety Division

The rapid agricultural development in Lithuania would not be possible without creating and using new and advanced plant varieties. The Plant Varieties Division is responsible for the registration of plant varieties – their entry in the National List of Plant Varieties and for the protection of plant varieties as breeders' intellectual property products in the Republic of Lithuania.

The Plant Variety Division specialists examine and register the breeder’s applications for the Plant Variety Listing into the National List of Plant Varieties or for Plant Variety Protection in the Republic of Lithuania, organize the performance of mandatory testing for distinctness, uniformity and stability in the competent European Union Member States institutions as well as tests for value for cultivation and use, and check the proposed plant variety denominations. Tests for Cultivation and Use are carried out in five Plant Varieties Testing Divisions of the Plant Service located in different Lithuanian soil and climatic zones. During these tests the variety harvest, the quality of the grown production, the variety resistance to adverse growing conditions and other characteristics are assessed. The aim is that the National List of Plant Varieties should contain only high quality, well adapted to the Lithuanian conditions varieties of plants, and this list could serve farmers and other seed users' interests. Every year over 450 varieties of agricultural plant species are tested. The data of Cultivation and Use testing are analyzed, summarized and submitted to the plant breeders and the State Board for Plant Varieties Evaluation with the aim of registering new plant varieties. Interested users can find plant variety descriptions and each year data for value for cultivation and use in the State Plant Service under the Ministry of Agriculture of the Republic of Lithuania website www.vatzum.lt. Information Bulletins for Plant Breeders’ Rights and the National List of Plant Varieties issued twice a year are published in this website as well.

Legal Protection could be granted to varieties of all plant species in the Republic of Lithuania.

The Division specialists participate at the meetings of the International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV), the Administrative Council of the Community Plant Variety Office (CPVO) and at the meetings with examination offices, the European Commission, the European Council working group and provide these institutions with all the required information.