Reimagining the Role of National Genebanks: Purposes, Priorities, and Programs

Abstract Since collecting and conservation efforts for plant genetic resources began in earnest a century ago, genebanks and stored accessions have proliferated, irrationally so. Many smaller national genebanks are falling considerably short of their mandates to conserve diversity and promote its use. Combined and functioning as intended, the International Treaty, the Crop Trust and the Svalbard Global Seed Vault create the context in which these genebanks could safely and positively transition to focus on facilitating experimentation and use by their farmers. There is precedent for a creative approach in the massive distribution of seeds to farmers in the U.S. in the 1800s that enabled the introduction, spread and adaptation of many crops. Progress will require resolution of the Treaty’s ‘access and benefit-sharing’ impasse, which could be advanced by an embrace of the Treaty’s provisions, more collaboration for conservation, and a facilitated shift in focus to the distribution and use of genetic resources, especially by smaller genebanks and for ‘opportunity crops’ of primary interest to developing countries.