There’s a bit of a nuance. On the one hand- the law is clear. You patent a thing- you own the rights. There are other things in the world to grow. On the other hand though- it’s more complex and who says the law is right? A person can patent life. You don’t even have to create life to patent it. The genes in your body are owned as the IP of some company. We could go to some moral place with that- but here’s a practical one- it not only raises the cost tremendously to do research into things like treating disease- but a company can put right block a persons research if they “own” a gene needed for it.
The idea is to protect the rights of those doing expensive genetic research- no one would spend huge amounts of time and money to discover a gene simply so someone else can skip the expensive R&D and “copy their homework.” However- there’s more nuance than that and companies abuse and game these protections. Several supplies provide most of the seed for a good deal of farming world wide. They own those seeds genome. You can’t grow without contract, you can’t breed or alter or improve it. What’s more they build in genetic resistances to common pesticides they also use and sell.
That means crops you don’t buy from them will die if the most common pesticides are used. You don’t even have to use said pesticides. A wind or rain or etc. just has to bring them to your crops. There are more examples like that. What we have is an effective monopoly in these fields and a legally protected monopoly in which one entity can dictate any terms they choose and people have no real choice.
The idea behind laws protecting genetic IP are meant to support capitalism, and capitalism is supposed to support free markets where the most innovative and productive are rewarded. Laws like this end up enforcing artificial monopoly which is neither at the core of true capitalism or for the betterment of mankind and society. The only monopoly that is even theoretically truly capitalist is where one person is so much better that no one uses any competition- not a monopoly where the law prevents competition. It’s not a surprise that we’ve seen consolidation of wealth and wages falling behind inflation as we have seen huge conglomerates lock down entire industries so that no one can compete even if they offer better ways and products. So that would be what would upset me. Business law should protect consumers and incite competition not squash it.
Were the farmers educated enough to know what a patent was and that they were violating it? How did they get the potatoes in the first place? Did Lays offer to replant other potatoes if there truly was a misunderstanding? I think if the farmers knew what they were doing was wrong and said no fuck u then lays is in the right for suing
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· 5 years ago
Yeah something is missing here... we need more data. If this was just a small group of rural farmers how did the company even find out they were doing it and they're not just going to randomly test every potato patch on every random acre of every piece of land. Another misconception about this that people have is thinking the growers and producers PepsiCo gets their produce from are owned by PepsiCo... which is just not true and in many cases these growers and producers are generating crops for a multitude of different companies using huge portfolios of leased patents... so the idea that this was some random use or pure coincidence is a bit absurd. The idea the PepsiCo was even made aware of it is also extremely absurd. Something about this stinks.
I think it would be, planting potatoes and farming in general are hard work and if Pepsi is suing them for already grown potatoes and possibly confiscating them or not letting them sell the the farmers lose out on a whole years salary. These people are already struggling and a corporation is taking away one year of hard work
I would agree- and in a larger sense I’m a fan of “trade secrets.” Namely- that if you have a “hustle” it’s your job to do a better job or protect your hustle. Look at tea or silk. While they didn’t engineer those things in a lab- China had the juice, but people snuck it away and broke what was in essence a monopoly. A potato is a plant. If I am able to grow a potato it is my potato- wether you engineered it or not or cross bred generations or not. In my mind it’s no more right to “own” a species of potato than for someone to claim ownership of a breed of dog. You can own a potato plant- and the potatoes it bears, but if you can’t keep it under wraps that’s on you.
Monsanto's been pulling this shit for years. They patent a variety, sell it to a farmer, pollinators do what pollinators do, the genes wind up in farms all over the county, Monsanto brings in the lawyers and says you are infringing out patent, drives the farmers out of business.
Pepsi dropped the lawsuit. Pepsi claimed it would end the suit if the farmers used different seeds or joined Pepsi's program. The offer to become part of Pepsi's program seemed to piss everyone off and a number of different groups backed the farmers. I think the political pressure forced Pepsi to just drop the whole thing.
I have worked in the farming industry before and the large corporation has all the right to sue them if the seed of the potato was patented by them. Every farmer grows and nurtures their own trees or seeds to their own liking and sometimes enhances the trees or seeds to have a better produce and in most cases they patent the trees or seeds. It is then illegal for any other farmer to use the same seed or tree to grow their produce unless the seed or tree is bought directly from that farmer with a patent cost owed to them.
Is this real?
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-india-pepsi-farmers/pepsico-sues-four-indian-farmers-for-using-its-patented-lays-potatoes-idUSKCN1S21EL
It seems that Lays engineered or designed a type of potato called FC5 and patented it
The farmers then grew those potatoes without asking permission from Lays
So I'm not sure I see what's wrong here
Like it or not, if someone patents something it's illegal to copy it