Millennium Seed Bank Partnership facts for kids

The Millennium Seed Bank Partnership (MSBP or MSB) is the largest project in the world focused on saving plant seeds outside of their natural homes. It's like a giant "insurance policy" for plants! This amazing project is run by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in the UK.

The idea for the project started in 1995, and work began in 1996. The main building, called the Wellcome Trust Millennium Building, is located at Wakehurst Place in West Sussex. Its main goal is to prevent plants from becoming extinct in the wild. It does this by collecting and storing their seeds for future use. The seeds are kept safe in huge underground frozen rooms, making it the world's largest collection of wild plant seeds.

How the Project Works

The Millennium Seed Bank works with many other groups around the world. They send teams on expeditions to collect seeds, especially from plants that grow in dry areas. When seeds are collected, a part of the collection is usually kept in the country where it was found. A duplicate set is then sent to the Millennium Seed Bank in the UK for storage.

This teamwork helps countries meet important global goals, like the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation. The seed bank at Kew has grown a lot over the years. The current building was designed by Stanton Williams and opened by Prince Charles in 2000.

Visitors can explore the building and see how the seeds are prepared. Through special windows, you can watch scientists cleaning and getting seeds ready. You can also see the entrance to the underground vaults where the seeds are stored at a very cold temperature of -20°C (that's -4°F!).

The project has achieved some amazing things. In April 2007, it stored its one billionth seed, which was a type of African bamboo called Oxytenanthera abyssinica. By October 2009, the project had reached its goal of banking 10% of all the world's wild plant species. As of June 2015, the bank held seeds from over 34,000 wild plant species, totaling more than 1.9 billion seeds. This means they have now saved over 13% of the world's wild plant species!

What the Project Aims To Do

The main goals of the Millennium Seed Bank Partnership are:

• To collect seeds from 75,000 different plant species. This goal was set for 2020, and it represents about 25% of all known plants.
• To collect seeds from every native plant species in the UK.
• To do more research on how to best save and preserve seeds and plants.
• To be a central place for this kind of research and to encourage people to learn about and support plant conservation.

Working with Other Countries

The Millennium Seed Bank has more than 100 partnerships with countries all over the world. These include Australia, Mexico, Chile, Kenya, China, the United States, Jordan, Mali, Malawi, Madagascar, Burkina Faso, Botswana, Tanzania, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, and South Africa.

Australia is a very important partner because its plants make up about 15% of all the world's plant species. Sadly, about 22% of these Australian plants are at risk of becoming extinct.

How Seeds Are Preserved

When seed collections arrive at the Millennium Seed Bank, they can be in different forms. Sometimes they are still inside fruits, and sometimes they are already clean. Each collection usually comes with a special plant sample that helps identify the plant correctly.

The seeds are immediately moved to a dry room. Then, they are carefully cleaned to remove any dirt or other plant parts. Scientists also X-ray the seeds, count them, and then store them at -20°C. The seeds are kept in airtight glass containers with small packets of silica gel. These packets change color if any moisture gets into the container, which helps ensure the seeds stay dry.

Shortly after being stored, the seeds are tested to see if they can still grow. This is called a germination test. They are tested again every 10 years. If there aren't many seeds left in a collection, the team prefers to go back to the wild and collect more.

Sharing Seeds for Research

If scientists or researchers need seeds for their studies, they can ask the Millennium Seed Bank for them. If it's allowed by law, the MSB can provide up to 60 seeds for free. This is for trusted, non-commercial groups who need them for research, restoring natural areas, or reintroducing plants into the wild. All seeds are shared to help everyone benefit and without making a profit.

The MSB also runs the UK Native Seed Hub. This hub helps make sure that high-quality native UK seeds are available to groups working on conservation and restoration projects. This helps make the UK's natural environments stronger and healthier.

See also

In Spanish: Proyecto de Banco de Semillas del Milenio para niños

• Svalbard Global Seed Vault
• Australian Grains Genebank