This European law could change Britain's gardens forever...
New regulations will dramatically cut the range of plants available in our nurseries and garden centres, argues Graham Spencer
"The European Commission is planning to add new regulation to the trade in garden plants. This is part of a process to replace a mishmash of existing regulations and directives with fewer new laws. But the proposals include extended powers, bringing new regulation to ornamental horticulture that will drastically reduce the range of plants available in the trade.
Current legislation allows growers and nurserymen to sell any ornamental plant variety by name if that variety is "common knowledge". Common knowledge is taken to mean any plant variety that has appeared in a catalogue, website, magazine or reference book with the variety name and some sort of brief description (which might be as short as "pink flowers in May, 30cm tall").
The new proposed EU Regulation on Plant Reproductive Material removes this possibility and requires that any named variety has an "officially recognised description" (ORD). The regulation says that the ORD must include the specific characteristics of the variety and make it identifiable. The UK trade, together with Defra, is of the opinion that the ORD will need to be a very detailed botanical description. For example, consider the lavender variety 'Hidcote' - a very widely grown variety. It is one of more than 300 varieties of lavender that are sold in the UK. In order for the variety to be identifiable from the ORD, the ORD would need to include details as small as the size and colour of the hairs on the leaf.
To write an ORD will require an experienced person with access to plant material of the variety. We offer a description writing service in our company, but charge £400 to £500 for each variety. It is a task which can take a day or more. It requires measurements to be taken when the plant is in growth, in bud, in flower and in seed - so needing many months of observation. The resulting description can be two to four pages long..."
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/gardening-blog/2013/sep/26/eu-regulation-garden-plants Ignorance is bliss, bliss is happiness, I am happy...to draw your attention to the possible connectivity in the foregoing.
