A Quick Guide to Cannabis Patents: What You Need to Know

Amid the quick expansion of the legal cannabis market, many cannabis growers and business owners are pushing to secure intellectual property rights for the strains and products they’ve created. Cannabis patents currently exist in a still-clouded regulatory atmosphere thanks to federal prohibition, but it’s still possible to receive one — and the cannabis industry is certainly rising to the challenge to secure their own rights to continue cultivating strains that have long been part of the genetic and intellectual commons. In the midst of this push for protecting cannabis intellectual property, there has been a rash of court cases and developments that have changed the foundation of cannabis patents in America. So what does it mean for the average cannabis consumer, who perhaps has heard to be wary of the day a patent-wielding Monsanto enters the cannabis industry? Here is a basic guide to what you need to know about cannabis patents. What Is a Cannabis Patent? In the United States, there are three kinds of patents: utility patents, for a process or application of particular products; design patents, generally for industrial products; and plant patents, for new varieties of plants. Each of these types of patents could apply to cannabis products. For example, in 2017, a Nevada-based firm with the slightly presumptuous name Cannabis Sativa Inc did win a plant patent for a strain called Ecuadorian Sativa. The firm boasted of its high content of the terpene limonene, and its possible curative capacities for various ailments — not of THC. The company was…

Excerpt only …
READ MORE BELOW
Source : cannabis now
Link to original : A Quick Guide to Cannabis Patents: What You Need to Know
reposted by Cannabis News World