62 I SEED WORLD EUROPE I SEEDWORLD.COM/EUROPE | OCTOBER 2026 Seized seed is the visible end of a much less visible problem. AIB’s growing intelligence network is helping identify illegal reproduction and other infringements across markets. Ignacio Giacchi is the managing director of AIB. Basile de Bary is the CEO of SAKATA Vegetables Europe and chairman of the AIB board of directors. Data from 2023–2025 shows that downstream value-chain actors account for the majority of infringement involvement. Distributors, in particular, show a sharp increase in detected involvement in 2025. “This is not about ‘bad outsiders’,” says de Bary. “It is about vulnerabilities within our own commercial ecosystem. If we want fairness in the seed sector, we have to acknowledge that reality.” “RISK IS CONCENTRATED, BUT NOT CONFINED” Certain countries, Italy, Türkiye, Egypt and Morocco, account for a substantial share of reports. Hiring Technical Coordinators in key markets coincided with reporting surges, particularly in Türkiye (2024) and Egypt (2025). Yet the issue is not confined to hotspots. The number of non-hotspot countries reporting increased over the period analysed. Infringement risk, AIB concludes, is geographically adaptive. “Risk is concentrated, but it is not confined,” Giacchi says. “The question is not whether infringement is occurring beyond core markets — it is whether we can mobilise the necessary resources to detect and address it.” THREE CROPS, MOST OF THE RISK The data shows that infringement is highly concentrated in a small number of crops. Since 2023, approximately 63% of infringement reports relate to just three crops—tomato, lettuce, and onion. This concentration enables more targeted and effective prevention strategies. One example is the Seed Pelleting Audit Scheme. Through annual audits, seed sampling and DNA analysis against a central ised database, AIB secures a critical upstream supply-chain node. In lettuce, infringement detection at the pelleting stage increased from 11% in 2023 to around 14.5% in 2025. The report emphasises that stable detection rates reflect improved visibility, not worsening behaviour. Commercially, the implications are significant. With the EU lettuce seed market estimated at approximately €215 million, the detected infringement signal implies around €31 million of seed potentially affected. “Even small reductions in risk translate into meaningful rev enue protection,” de Bary says. “This is not theoretical. It is com mercial reality.” FROM CASE BUILDING TO CASE EXECUTION Since 2023, enforcement has been deliberately investigation-heavy, with 2024 marking a peak in intelligence-led enforcement. The rebound in enforcement share in 2025 suggests a transition from case building to case execution, a more mature and structured enforcement pipeline. AIB’s ambition is not simply to respond to infringements, but to reshape the enforcement environment itself. “Individual compa nies cannot address systemic infringement alone,” Giacchi empha sises. “Scale and continuity matter. That is what collective action provides.” A COLLECTIVE ACTION IMPERATIVE Illegal seed practices distort entire markets, not just individual bal ance sheets. Pricing fairness erodes. Return on varietal investment weakens. Trust across the value chain is strained. Without AIB, infringement remains fragmented, local and largely unseen. With AIB, it becomes identifiable, actionable and increasingly risky. “The seed sector thrives on innovation,” de Bary concludes. “But innovation only works in an environment where rules are respected. AIB helps create that environment, not through over-en forcement, but through smarter, actionable intelligence.” Three years of data suggest something important: the sector is no longer guessing. It is measuring. And in doing so, it is turning what was once invisible into something far harder to ignore.
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