농민의 종자권 실현을 위한 방안 모색 — 종자산업법을 중심으로 —

Seeds that have been passed down by farmers for thousands of years, adapting to the region and climate, were naturally considered to be the rights of farmers. However, as the scope of intellectual property rights expanded to include living organisms, the impact directly affected seeds. As a result, farmers' rights to seeds that they could freely choose were restricted, and the practice of farmers collecting seeds themselves or sowing or selling the collected seeds began to be prohibited. However, as farmers have insisted that farmers’ rights and rights to seeds should be guaranteed as farmers’ rights, the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture(ITPGRFA) and the United Nations Declaration on Rights of Peasants(UNDROP) have become possible as a result. However, individual countries are still not properly realizing the guarantee of these rights. The Seed Industry Act of our country treats the seed industry as an aspect of the industry by supporting the seed industry and guaranteeing seed sales rights for seed dealers, and institutionalizes the principle of prohibiting individual farmers from selling seeds. This paper attempts to examine the possibility that the farmers’ seed sales are institutionally guaranteed in this reality. Since the purpose of selling seeds by farmers is to meet their needs, not for profit, it is possible to guarantee these by treating them as sales under civil law. Observing the fact that our country's case law denies farmers' merchant status, we sought to examine the possibility of selling seeds as well as agricultural products. Guaranteeing the farmers' rights and the right to seeds is a way to overcome various crises that are currently arising, such as alternatives to the climate crisis, the birth of agroecology, and a solution to food problems, and it can best embody the communal value of traditional knowledge that farmers have preserved for a long time. Affirmative policy changes are needed for farmers' seed sales.