The European Union has reached a provisional agreement on the new regulation on the production and marketing of plant reproductive material: https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-11548-2026-INIT/en/pdf
Formal recognition for grassroots conservation
For the first time, conservation networks and organisations operate within a formalised legal space, moving out of the legal grey area. These groups can produce, exchange, and market diverse material without profit, having granted exemptions from professional operator registration, strict certification, and heavy traceability rules.
Legal protection for farmer seed exchange
The new rules explicitly allow farmers to exchange seeds in kind without monetary compensation, supporting the dynamic management of their own seed. However, this win comes with some limitations, as exchanges are restricted to small quantities at the local level and completely prohibit certain species for phytosanitary reasons.
Diverse seeds for amateur gardeners
Final users and hobby gardeners will have easier access to agro-biodiversity, as operators can market material to them without variety registration or mandatory seed certification. This ensures a wider diversity of varieties for consumers, however producers must still meet basic quality, health, and germination standards.
Pathways for locally adapted and organic varieties
The regulation creates a simplified registration pathway for conservation and locally adapted varieties, allowing them to be registered based on an officially recognised description rather than strict technical examinations. Furthermore, the existing regime for organic heterogeneous material remains unchanged, ensuring stability and preventing the entry of genetically modified organisms in this category.
1. Conservation and locally adapted varieties.
The new rules formally recognise the importance of agro-biodiversity by creating a simplified pathway for traditional and locally adapted seeds. Plant reproductive material belonging to these varieties can be produced and marketed as standard seed, bypassing strict certification requirements and without control plot tests (Article 26(1)).
These definitions allow the results of participatory plant breeding or low-input breeding to be marketed. Instead of passing strict technical examinations, these varieties are registered based on an officially recognised description (Article 47(1)).
Any actor can register them, not only professional operators, and there are no quantity or regional limitations for marketing them, though they must generally be maintained within their region of origin (Article 26(1)).
To support long-term preservation, the registration period for these varieties is extended to 30 years (Article 69(1)).
On the downside, the rules on registration are spread over several articles, creating unnecessary legal complexity for small actors. Furthermore, the regime comes with extensive 6-year record-keeping and traceability requirements (Article 26(3) and Article 42).
2. Farmer seed and plant reproductive material exchange.
The regulation introduces a dedicated space for small-scale farmers to share seeds outside of the commercial market with some limitations (Article 30). Farmers are explicitly allowed to exchange plant reproductive material in kind without monetary compensation to support the dynamic management of their own seed (Article 30(1)).
Farmers engaging in this exchange are exempt from registering as professional operators (Article 41) and are freed from the new commercial 6-year traceability rules (Article 42). The seed must be derived from the farmer’s own harvest and produced on their own premises (Article 30(1)).
The exchange must occur at a local level and is strictly limited to small quantities defined by national competent authorities per species and per farmer, though exchange might possibly be allowed between different countries (Article 30(2)).
Plant health rules still apply to all exchanged material, and the use of commercial intermediaries is prohibited (Article 30(2)). For phytosanitary and public safety reasons, farmers cannot exchange material of cannabis, opium poppy, potato, citrus, or vine (Article 30(1)).
3. Hobby gardener seed and material exchange.
Amateur gardeners and non-professional users benefit from rules designed to ensure a wider diversity of seeds are available to the public.
Operators can market material directly to non-professional users without variety registration and without mandatory seed certification (Article 28(1)).
For unregistered varieties, a description based on private documentation must be made publicly available (Article 28(1)).
Production rules are lighter than those applying to commercial crop production. The material must be sold in small quantities, be practically free from quality pests, and have sufficient germination capacity (Article 28(1)).
Businesses exclusively marketing to non-professional users do not need to register as professional operators (Article 41). However, traceability rules are extensive, as records of production need to be kept for 6 years (Article 28(1)).
Labelling and packaging rules will be set in more detail in a future implementing act (Article 28(2)). This derogation excludes some crop species like poppy, hemp, potatoes and turf grass, meaning producers must sell registered varieties to amateur gardeners for these species (Article 28(1)).
4. Small and medium enterprises working with diversity.
Small seed companies and organic actors working with highly diverse materials have new legal tools to bring their products to market.
The organic heterogeneous material regime is maintained without changes, which creates stability for authorities and operators starting to use the regime (Article 27).
There is no possibility to produce and market non-organic heterogeneous material, which ensures this material will remain free of genetically modified organisms. The regulation mandates adjusted uniformity requirements for organic varieties suitable for organic production (Article 47(2)).
The examination for value for sustainable cultivation and use is still predominantly a trait-based assessment that will look into yield first (Article 52(1)). This examination will not take place in organic or low-input conditions except for organic varieties, representing a missed opportunity to contribute to broader sustainability (Article 52(4)). This testing will happen for agricultural plants, vine and potatoes, but there will be no testing for fruits and vegetables.
Enterprises can also produce and market preservation mixtures of seeds aimed at restoring the natural environment or conserving genetic resources within their region of origin (Article 22).
5. Seed savers organisations possibilities and restrictions.
Gene banks, networks, and non-profit organisations dedicated to conservation receive special recognition and a formalised legal space (Article 29).
Organisations and their members can produce, exchange, and market material without profit for the purpose of conservation (Article 29(1)).
All material, including unregistered varieties, is allowed to circulate within these networks, and they can freely receive material from outside the networks.
These networks are broadly exempt from standard variety registration and seed certification rules (Article 29(1)), professional operator registration (Article 41c(1)(b)), and standard 6-year traceability rules (Article 42(3a)).
If a conservation organisation or network is officially recognised as a gene bank by national authorities, the new regulation does not apply to them for conservation transfers (Article 2(4) and Recital 13b).
All marketed material needs to be practically free of quality pests, but this is governed by a quite pragmatic definition.
6. Scope and general administrative burden.
The scope of the regulation is in principle wider than today, viewing all transfers as marketing even if they do not have a commercial nature or intent (Article 3(3)).
The legislation maintains an administratively heavy system based on controls and prohibitions, introducing significant new traceability and 6-year record-keeping obligations for professional operators to know where they received material from and who they gave it to (Article 42 and Article 43).
Transfers for research, breeding, and scientific purposes are exempt from the regulation entirely (Article 2(4)).
7. Transparency and the variety register. The new regulation introduces minimum standards for the EU variety register to ensure more harmonised information is available to seed users (Article 45). The register will detail whether a variety is a hybrid or a new genomic technique variety (Annex VII). However, this harmonised register will not contain information about intellectual property rights that may restrict the use of the seeds, nor will it list all breeding methods used to obtain the variety.
Written by Judit Feher, Kvann
2026-07-22