Tim Johnson of Illinois Foundation Seeds is currently serving aS president of the International Seed Federation (ISF).
“The International Seed Federation has 80 countries that are involved,” Tim said. “What we do is promote movement of seed, protection of intellectual property (IP) rights, and support of companies moving seed globally.”
IP was a big focus during a Chinese-American seed symposium that took place prior to the start of the American Seed Trade Association (ASTA) CSS 2012 and Seed Expo in Chicago this week, and Tim says it’s an important global issue when it comes to seed trade. “It’s really important that there’s good intellectual property right laws in countries so that companies will not only invest in those countries but move their technologies, products, germplasm, into (them),” he said. “So we want to promote that in China and help them understand.”
Tim also talked about the signing of the MOU with China and The Accord in this interview: Interview with Tim Johnson