VICE-PRESIDET Dr Philip Mpango has asked relevant ministries and institutions to ensure that innovators under the agriculture sector are well known and protected by law to benefit from their innovations.
Ownership of innovations assures innovators of decent income, a situation that encourages them to continue coming up with more creative ideas.
Dr Mpango revealed this on Tuesday when officiating at the ongoing annual Nanenane Agriculture exhibition taking place nationally in Mbeya Region.
“It is necessary to identify innovators in the sector of agriculture, fishing and livestock as one of the motivations and help them to protect their designs by law’’.
I’m happy to see the designer who built the machine for peeling corn and other products,” said Dr Mpango, adding this type of innovator should be assisted to enable him to benefit from his innovation.
Initially, welcoming the Vice-President, Minister for Agriculture Mr Hussein Bashe said it is high time all food and agriculture products produced in the country were recognised by relating them to intellectual property issues unlike the current situations.
“Tanzania is rich in many food crops as well as the best seeds that have been researched by research centres in the country but when they are exported they are not recognised as originating in Tanzania, so the intellectual property issue is very important to consider,” Mr Bashe said.
The Business Registration and Licensing Agency (BRELA) is also participating in the exhibition where it provides intellectual property education to people.
The agency is moving door to door at exhibition grounds in Mbeya to make sure the exhibitors gain knowledge of intellectual property so that they can be protected by law.
“In this year’s Nanenane exhibition held under the theme ‘Youth and Women are a Strong Foundation for Sustainable Food Systems’, we offer instant services like registration of companies, business names, industrial registration certificates, business licence and so forth,” said BRELA Head of Communication Unit, Ms Roida Andusamile.
She said BRELA will continue to improve its internal registry system and put in place good strategies to improve services and attract more innovators in order to increase the number of registries and protect their work as well as ensure that the innovators get the benefit of their jobs.
