EU Court Sides with Spanish Farmer in Mandarin Dispute Against Moroccan King

The European justice agrees with the company José Cánovas Pardo, which was operating the mandarin variety exclusively produced by the Nadorcott Protection company, owned by the Moroccan royal family, without authorization, on the statute of limitations for initiating legal action. For the judicial authority, the statute of limitations must begin to run from the moment the license holder discovered the illegal exploitation and identified its author, and not at the end of it.

To read: EU Court Rules in Favor of Moroccan Royals in Mandarin Variety Dispute

The judge had to decide whether the Nadorcott Protection company still had the right to take legal action or whether this right was prescribed after the expiration of the three-year period set by European regulations. It turns out that the company José Cánovas Pardo had started producing this variety without authorization on a plantation in the city of Alhama de Murcia since 2006, and that as early as October 2007, the company of the Moroccan royal family had sent him a formal notice to stop the exploitation. But it was not until November 2011 that Nadorcott Protection took legal action on this matter.

It is now up to the Spanish courts to determine whether the facts attributed to the Pardo company are verified, and whether the Moroccan company was actually aware of the illegal exploitation of its mandarin more than three years before initiating legal action in November 2011.