Open Sourcing Plant Seeds : The Open Source Seed Initiative & similar efforts | CIARD

"Open Access may refer to scientific and research data, open educational resources, governmental data, using Creative Commons licenses for the licensing of outcomes like publications, presentations and any other kind of documentation, linked open data etc. Through our participation in related events we try to keep up with updates in this context, get to know people who are also working in these fields and transfer this experience and updates to our projects and work. This is just one side of the whole image of course; all these refer to digital content developed based on agricultural research using actual plants - but what about the plants and their seeds? How easy is it for farmers to get access to them? What is the role of patents and licensing applied to plant genetic material? We recently came across a number of initiatives which are also working in the field of opening up access to the use and reuse of seeds, making good use of the land and even facilitating the construction of open source hardware which can be used for agricultural purposes. The following paragraphs contain information collected from various sources and aim to provide a brief overview of the current status of such initiatives ..."