Who gets to call rice basmati? Why the Federal Court refused the word as a trade mark

The bag of basmati in your pantry may say Product of India or Product of Pakistan. The Federal Court was not satisfied that the word basmati, on its own, can separate rice certified by India’s agricultural export authority from rice that is not. On 11 August 2026 Justice Dowling dismissed an appeal by that authority, the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority, or APEDA, over its application to register BASMATI as a certification trade mark for rice. India’s basmati trade mark bid for the word alone has now failed before the Registrar of Trade Marks and in court.

A certification trade mark tells buyers that goods have certain qualities or characteristics, which can include where they come from. IP Australia says it may not register one unless the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has approved the rules behind it. Under section 177 of the Trade Marks Act 1995, an application must be rejected if the mark cannot distinguish goods certified by the applicant from goods that are not.

A word for a kind of rice

APEDA is a statutory body set up under a 1985 Act of the Indian Parliament, and it runs a licensing scheme for basmati exported from India to Australia. It filed two applications, one for the word and one for a logo containing it. In December 2022 a delegate of the Registrar refused the word and accepted the logo. The court then considered the word afresh.

Its answer turned on what basmati means to people here. In Australia, Justice Dowling accepted, the word signifies a type of rice grown in more than one place, India and Pakistan included. The evidence established that substantial volumes of Pakistani basmati are sold in Australia. In 2018 alone, Coles sold 499,516 one-kilogram packs of a single basmati product from Pakistan.

Agreed facts put basmati exports from India to Australia at more than 306,095 tonnes between 1988 and 2019, worth around US$380 million. Those sales did not carry the case. With the word also used for Pakistani rice that APEDA has not certified, the judge did not accept that volume alone showed the mark had come to distinguish APEDA’s rice. The word, he concluded, is “a term that other traders, without improper motives, might legitimately need to use”.

Most answers named no place at all

APEDA’s evidence included a survey by Ipsos Australia, conducted in April 2020 for its application. When respondents were asked what came to mind at the name and what more they could say about it, 70.9 per cent of answers were classed as rice only. On where basmati rice comes from, 55.6 per cent of answers mentioned no place. At most 29.8 per cent of respondents said India alone, a figure the Registrar called likely overstated. Pakistan, the next most often named country, came up in 9.9 per cent of answers.

The judge gave the survey limited weight. At its highest, he wrote, the data “may establish that consumers have an association between BASMATI and India”. It did not prove that the public would rely on the word alone as a sign that rice had been certified by APEDA.

One certifier, two countries

APEDA also argued that basmati is a geographical indication shared across borders, pointing to Australia’s obligations under the international TRIPS Agreement. The judge accepted the Registrar’s submission that those obligations give no principled basis for widening section 177. He did leave room: a geographical indication spanning more than one country could in principle count among the other circumstances the section allows for. Recognition in multiple jurisdictions does not meet the test, he found, where the mark covers rice “certified under the regime of one jurisdiction alone”.

Packaging did not change the outcome either. Food sold in Australia must already be labelled with its place of origin, the judgment notes. APEDA’s rules would have required retail packs carrying the mark to show Product of India prominently, and APEDA proposed a condition preserving the legitimate use of basmati for rice from Pakistan. The judge said that even with both, ordinary Australian consumers would understand the word the same way.

A second basmati trade mark, still contested

The logo, trade mark 1991951, is an oval of mountains and grain bearing the word Basmati. It was filed on 26 February 2019. Its acceptance was put on hold in January 2023 while the ACCC assessed its certification rules, and it was formally accepted on 14 September 2023.

The logo drew two oppositions. Ricegrowers Limited lodged one in November 2023, and the register now lists it as discontinued. The Trade Development Authority of Pakistan followed in April 2024. The register still shows the logo as accepted and opposed, with dispute evidence received as recently as 30 September 2026. Among the evidence in the court case was the Pakistani authority’s own application for a certification logo mark featuring the name.

On 12 August 2026 Pakistan’s Ministry of Commerce welcomed the ruling as a significant victory for the country’s position that “no single national authority can claim an exclusive right over the word Basmati”. Under the Trade Marks Act, an appeal from this ruling to a Full Court of the Federal Court, usually three or more judges sitting together, would need the court’s leave. IP Australia’s register still lists the word application as under examination, with court action pending.

There are two orders: the appeal is dismissed, and APEDA pays the Registrar’s costs. Neither mentions a label. The origin line on the pack still tells you where the rice comes from. The word itself, the court found, names a kind of rice, and that rice grows on both sides of a border.