The annual meeting of OECD was held in Paris, France from 8 – 12 September 2003.  Two workshops were included during this period, i.e. one on Accreditation and one on Genetically Modified Seed issues.

Amendments were made for cotton certification during the above-mentioned meeting.  According to these amendments, it would now be possible to certify cotton hybrids and corresponding certification rules had been introduced for this purpose.  A Working Group, however, was established to review isolation distances for a presentation at the next annual meeting.  OECD Rules for the certification of grass seed mixtures for amenity purposes had also been approved.

New applications for submission as participating countries in the OECD Seed Schemes were the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Colombia and Uganda.  SANSOR was requested to assist the OECD Secretariat in a technical visit to Uganda during 5 – 11 June 2004 in order to initiate the formal process.  Report-back on this visit would be presented to the next annual meeting in 2004 for a possible decision on accepting Uganda as a new participating member country in the OECD Seed Schemes for crop crucifers & other oil fibre species, cereals, maize & sorghum and vegetables.

International observers:   A point of interest was the report by the United Nations Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO).  The latter report was leading an inter-agency initiative, intending to involve the relevant international agencies and standard-setting bodies to develop an internet-based portal (International Portal on Food Safety, Animal & Plant Health), which would permit current standards, regulations and other relevant documentation to be accessed from a single point.

Accreditation:  It was decided that the experiment on seed sampling (including fastening & labelling) and seed analysis would continue until 31 March 2005.  After evaluating all statistical data received until December 2003 and comparison with the European Union (EU) experiment, however, it might result in a permanent practice option before the former date.

Certification of oil seed rape:  Based on an experiment conducted by the EU, a recommendation was made for more stringent requirements on hybrid varieties of Brassica napus when using the cytoplasmic male sterility method.  Male sterility in the seed-bearing parent line was to be increased from 98,0% to 99,0% for basic and the pollen parent line from 99,5% to 99,7% for certified seed.  A final decision would be made during a special OECD meeting scheduled for January 2004.

Certification of maize blends:  This particular proposal had been accepted and requirements would be introduced in appendix 9 of the Maize & Sorghum Scheme.  Where a pollinator-dependent hybrid maize variety is used with specified pollinators, it would be referred to as varietal association of hybrid maize to avoid confusion with the widely used definition of a blend (two or more lots of certified seed of the same generation of one variety).

Certification of herbage seed mixtures:  The certification of these mixtures was introduced to the Schemes, but only in the case of mixtures for amenity purposes.  The EU experiment for forage crops, however, ended in December 2003 and if equivalence could be reached with OECD, it would be implemented into the Seed Schemes immediately.

Land races, certification of origin:  The difference between land races and local varieties was unclear to the meeting.  There was, however, an interest for these types of varieties in the different corresponding zones of the world.  Inputs on this issue would have to be submitted to the OECD Secretariat by stakeholder countries for discussion.

Organic seed:  This was an important market, fast growing and in some countries already up to 10% of the market.  Standards and certification for the production of organic food were mostly set by private bodies and it should be kept that way.  If requirements were to be set by Governments, they could again become trade barriers. 

Increasing maximum seed lot size:  Both proposals for increasing seed lot sizes of grass and cereals to respectively 25 and 30 ton, were again referred to the International Seed Testing Association (ISTA) for consideration and a scientific opinion.  The next OECD meeting would consider the relevant opinion and results.

Variety purity standards applied to post-control:  Post-control standards in the OECD Seed Schemes were only given for certain hybrid varieties.  A questionnaire was sent to all participating countries for information on post-control standards applied for the different species.  Confusion on the scope of the questionnaire, however, resulted in countries giving all standards applied and not only for OECD certified seed.  This resulted in a request from OECD for resubmission of information on OECD post-control standards before October 2003.  After some discussion on post-control, it was decided that the country of production should be the country doing the post-control.  It was, however, left to the different Designated Authorities if special arrangements were to be made.

Consideration of adding a barcode containing official information on OECD labels:  Information prescribed for OECD labels was compulsory and fixed and not allowed to be changed in any way.  Adding a barcode would be investigated, as this could comply with OECD objectives to give information to facilitate international trade.  This issue would be investigated for report-back during the forthcoming year.

Review of significant seed-related developments since the previous year:  An Application was submitted for the further listing of varieties on Table 8 of the South African Plant Improvement Act concerning compulsory certification for:

Statistical data on implementation of the schemes:  The South African contribution was 0,7% of the total mass of 681 534 ton for OECD-certified seed.  This placed South Africa 19^th of the 41 countries participating actively during 2001/2002.  Certification comprised of ryegrass, lupins, cotton, maize and sorghum.

Genetically modified seed issues:  A discussion paper was presented on how to add new genetically modified varieties to the OECD variety list, i.e. harmonization with existing rules.  The application of a single, specific standard to all genetically modified off-types might be inappropriate from a scientific, risk-based perspective and the OECD Seed Schemes would have to pay particular attention to those aspects in the review on standards for varietal purity in these particular cases.  It was felt that it was the right time to revise definitions for varietal identity and purity, although caution was recommended in adopting new terminology and directions.

Appointments were made by Bolivia, Canada and Australia for discussion on the South African model for seed certification, the establishing of a seed trade organization like SANSOR and the manner of co-operation with Government.

Pine Pienaar (Technical Manager)
represented the SANSOR Secretariat
at the relevant meeting of the OECD.