Agriculture Minister Suriya affirmed that private sector registration protecting holy basil varieties does not affect citizens who grow them for personal consumption, but protected varieties cannot be propagated for sale without permission.
On 21 October 2026, Minister of Agriculture and Cooperatives Suriya Jungrungreangkit addressed concerns about private companies registering protection for holy basil varieties. He explained that the law allows private entities that research and develop new plant varieties to register and protect their rights in those varieties, similar to intellectual property protection for pharmaceutical research. He confirmed that such registration does not affect the general public, who can still grow the protected holy basil varieties for household consumption as usual, but they cannot propagate and sell these protected varieties without authorization.
Suriya added that the Department of Agriculture continues to conduct research and develop plant varieties so that farmers can benefit by using these improved varieties for cultivation.
These concerns arose after the BioThai Foundation disclosed that CP Ram Company Ltd. had registered protection for four new holy basil varieties: Kaewjuree 01 on 12 March 2024, and Kaewjuree 02, 03, and 04 on 24 May 2024, with protection lasting 12 years until 2036, under the Plant Variety Protection Act B.E. 2542 (1999).
According to official registration documents from the Department of Agriculture, all four holy basil varieties were developed from the native variety coded CPR1 by chemically inducing chromosome doubling combined with tissue culture techniques. This work started in April 2020, with cultivation trials conducted at Kasetsart University’s Kamphaeng Saen campus in Nakhon Pathom Province and CP Ram Company in Pathum Thani Province to select varieties suitable as ingredients for cooking.
BioThai raised concerns that if Thailand amends plant variety protection laws in line with the UPOV 1991 convention, it may impose greater restrictions on farmers' and citizens' rights to save and share protected seeds for replanting, even when not for commercial purposes, and could affect further breeding and development of plant varieties.