The Welsh Science Parks' Agri-Tech Cluster

Author Richard Wang Licence Public Domain Source Wikimedia Commons

 

Jane Lambert

On Friday 14 June 2024, I attended "Clwstwr Agritech" a webinar promoted by M-SParc and Aberinnovation, the Menai and Aberystwyth science parks.  At a time when much of the world's food production is threatened by climate change, the development of heat, flood, drought or pest-resistant crops and other food sources has never been more important.  Aberinnovation is literally next door to IBERS, the Institute of Biological, Environmental and Rural Sciences of Aberystwyth University.  M-SParc is a spin-off of Bangor University whose Centre for Applied Marine Sciences is one of the UK's leading research institutions in aquaculture. The attendance of Pryderi ap Rhisiart, Managing Director of M-SParc, and Rhian Hayward MBE, Chief Executive of Aberinnovation, indicated the importance of the occasion.

The webinar consisted of two presentations: one from UKRI on its Mid and North Wales Lauchpad: Cluster Management and the other from Selwyn Owen on Iona Minerals Ltd.  

The Mid and North Wales Launchpad is a £150,000 fund for a project to develop and manage the agri-tech and food technology innovation cluster in those regions.  It is open to UK-based businesses or institutions that will carry out their project work in the UK and which will have an impact on the agri-tech and food technology innovation cluster in Mid and North Wales.  Full details are published on the funding competition web page,  

Iona Minerals is described "as a new and early stage start-up venture, involved in the marketing, distribution of natural minerals".  The company's minerals have a variety of uses one of which is the treatment of chicken droppings in battery farms.  One of the by-products of this process is ammonia which has a number of industrial uses including combustion as a fuel and the preparation of blue hydrogen. 

Although neither speaker discussed the legal protection of the right to exploit new plant or seed varieties in this webinar, I mentioned it in the chat because that subject could well be raised in future webinars.  The rights of breeders of new plant varieties are protected in this country under the Plant Varieties Act 1997,  Plant breeders' rights have long been regarded as a Cinderella area of intellectual property law in this country though not in countries like Australia with a large viticulture industry.  However, that is likely to change with the need to respond to the challenges of climate change that I mentioned above,   I have written an introduction to Plant Breeders' Rights with links to my other articles on the subject.

Different countries protect plant breeders' rights in different ways.   In the USA, for instance, they are protected by a special type of patent known as a "plant patent".   There is an International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants ("UPOV Convention") which can be downloaded from the website of The International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV).

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