Seeds Bill 2025: India Proposes Digital Traceability, Graded Penalties, and Retains Farmers' Seed Rights
SDG 2: Zero Hunger | SDG 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
Institutions: Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare (MoA&FW)
The Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, has prepared a draft Seeds Bill, 2025, which introduces a comprehensive, modernized regulatory framework for seeds and planting materials, aimed at promoting quality, transparency, and the “Ease of Doing Business”. The proposed legislation is intended to repeal and replace the existing Seeds Act, 1966 and the Seeds (Control) Order, 1983.
The Bill’s key structural changes include:
Farmer Rights Protection: The Bill explicitly retains the right of farmers to grow, sow, save, use, exchange, share, or sell their farm seeds of any registered variety, except when selling under a brand name. Furthermore, farmers selling or exchanging seed produced on their own holdings are exempt from the penal provisions.
Mandatory Registration: It mandates the compulsory registration of all kinds or varieties of seed for sale, except those produced exclusively for export or the farmer’s own variety.
Universal Business Registration: It requires the registration of all commercial entities involved in the supply chain: seed producers (other than farmers), seed processing units, dealers, distributors, and plant nurseries.
Digital Traceability Mandate: It establishes the Centralized Seed Traceability Portal and mandates that all seed containers bear a Quick Response Code (QR Code) generated through this portal. This legal formalization and mandatory compliance are the primary, high-impact changes the new legislation introduces.
Central Accreditation System: To incentivize large, multi-state companies and promote ease of doing business, the Central Government may establish a merit-based Central Accreditation System. Companies accredited under this system are deemed to be registered by the State Government, and their registration cannot be rejected on technical, financial, or infrastructural grounds.
Graded Enforcement: It creates clear penalties based on the severity of the offense: Trivial, Minor, and Major. This shift aligns with the “Ease of Doing Business” initiative by proposing to decriminalize minor offenses while retaining stringent penalties (up to three years imprisonment and/or fines up to ₹30 lakh) for major violations like supplying spurious seeds.
Market Regulation: The Central Government may regulate the sale price of seeds of any kind or variety in emergent situations, defined as scarcity, abnormal price rise, monopolistic pricing, or profiteering.
The introduction of the Central Accreditation System is a crucial policy change, as it rationalizes regulatory approvals for multi-state seed companies, promoting investment and efficiency in the seed industry. This, coupled with the mandatory QR Code traceability, moves seed quality control from a paper-based system to a digital assurance system, directly addressing the national crisis of spurious seeds and safeguarding a basic input necessary for agricultural growth.
How are Seeds Bill, 2025 and the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights (PPV&FRA) Act, 2001, related?→ The relationship between the Seeds Bill, 2025 and the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights (PPV&FRA) Act, 2001, is one of complementary legislation designed to achieve different, yet integrated, goals for the agriculture sector.
The new Seeds Bill, 2025 is intended to repeal and replace the older Seeds Act, 1966. It primarily focuses on regulating the quality, sale, and distribution of commercial seeds, introducing systems for digital traceability (QR Codes) and graded penalties for violations like supplying spurious seeds. In contrast, the PPV&FRA Act, 2001, which remains in force, focuses on intellectual property rights, protecting breeders’ innovations, and, crucially, recognizing and rewarding farmers’ rights. The new Seeds Bill explicitly integrates with the PPV&FRA Act by safeguarding the farmer’s fundamental right to save, use, exchange, and sell farm seeds of any registered variety, with the single restriction being the sale of seed under a brand name. This ensures accountability for commercial branding while fully protecting farmer seed sovereignty.
Follow the full update here: Draft Seed Bill 2025