About
By storing the world's seeds, the Millennium Seed Bank (MSB) aims to provide an insurance policy against the extinction of plants in the wild.
This is important because plants provide food, building materials, fibres for clothing, medicines and fuel, but also it is preserving our botanical heritage for generations. However the destruction of plant habitats is happening so fast that it is not always possible to conserve plants within threatened habitats.
Collecting seeds and preserving them ex situ (away from their natural habitat) offers an economical and effective way to save seeds and keep them for posterity. In the future, if required, they can be germinated and reintroduced to the wild or used in scientific research
