The US apple brand 'Pink Lady America' has failed in its bid to have an Australian-owned community plant variety registration overturned at the EU General Court. In the recent judgment, handed down on September 24th, the General Court ruled that the Community Plant Variety Office (CPVO) was correct in determining that the Western Australian Agriculture Authority’s (WAAA) Cripps Pink apple variety was novel at the time it was registered.
The legal predecessor of the WAAA, the Department of Agriculture and Food of Western Australia, originally applied to register the Cripps Pink variety with the CPVO in 1995.
In 2014, Pink Lady America filed to have the Cripps Pink registration nullified on the grounds that it lacked novelty under the EU’s Council Regulation (EC) No 2100/94 on Community plant varieties.
Under the terms of that regulation, a variety is considered ‘new’ if it has not been sold in the EU either earlier than one year before the date of application, or four years outside the EU.
Worldipreview.com reports that in today’s judgment, the court found that the WAAA’s original application for the apple variety was made in 1995, less than one year after the regulation entered into force.
