Canada has extended the plant breeders’ rights protection period for potatoes from 20 to 25 years, following updates to the country’s legislation announced by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and supported by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. The move has been welcomed by the Potato Growers of Alberta (PGA), which sees the change as an important step towards strengthening varietal innovation and improving growers’ access to new potato varieties with better agronomic and commercial performance. According to the PGA, developing new potato varieties requires long periods of research, multiplication, evaluation, and commercialization before reaching sufficient market scale. Under the previous 20-year protection period, breeders had a more limited timeframe to recover their investments. By extending protection to 25 years, the organization expects stronger incentives for the development of new varieties and a broader range of options for growers, particularly in the seed potato segment.
Alberta remains a major player in Canada’s potato sector. In 2025, the province planted 6,789 hectares of seed potatoes, representing 28.6% of national seed potato production, according to data from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. Between 2020 and 2024, Alberta also accounted for an average of 23.5% of Canada’s total potato production, according to Statistics Canada, with the province’s seed potato sector growing around 200 varieties annually. Producers highlight that the new framework could help bring forward varieties better suited to evolving growing conditions, with improved disease resistance and stronger commercial yields. The updated legislation also includes measures to simplify administrative procedures, making the plant variety protection system easier to manage. Extending the protection period has been a priority for the PGA for more than a decade, and with this change, Canada strengthens its protection framework for potato breeding, creating a more attractive environment for innovation, investment, and competitiveness in the sector.
