In his recent paper in Plant Genetic Resources, Reimagining the Role of National Genebanks: Purposes, Priorities, and Programs, Cary Fowler offers a refreshingly blunt intervention for the world’s national genebanks.
The paper suggests a radical pivot: stop acting like dusty museums and start acting like high-energy dating agencies for seeds. Fowler argues that for many small, underfunded facilities, the traditional “Fort Knox” model of long-term conservation is a trap. If you can’t store seeds properly and you aren’t sharing your stash, you aren’t a guardian: you’re a threat. His solution?
Instead of waiting for breeders to call, who don’t exist anyway for a lot of “minor” crops, genebanks should be putting diversity directly into the hands of farmers. Fowler invokes the “inventive art” of 19th-century American agriculture, where the government functioned like a giant postal seed-swapping club. He envisions modern genebanks acquiring diversity, screening it, and sending out cleverly selected landraces and cultivars for farmers to try out in their own fields.
It’s a bold call to move from the passive “save it for a rainy day” mentality to an active “let’s see what grows in the rain” strategy. The future of diversity isn’t just in the freezer; it’s in the mail, at least for many underfunded national genebanks and so-called “opportunity crops.” Brave new world. But it does all assume the rest of the system is functioning — and is funded — properly…