Holding the wild in the seed: Place, escape and liminality at the Millennium Seed Bank Partnership

Abstract

The Millennium Seed Bank Partnership (MSBP), which conserves the seeds of wild plants, is the world's largest ex situ plant conservation project. Recourse to ex situ conservation, however, presents something of a paradox for the conservation of plants. Plant ecology often defies delineation into distinct units and is intricately rooted in place. ‘Plant‐being’, therefore, has elicited attention within the ‘more‐than‐human’ turn for its entangled and relational nature. Yet, as the author considers here through reference to her research within the MSBP, in the context of seed conservation, survival for plant species is pursued precisely through escaping place and entanglement. By ‘thinking‐with’ seed ecology, she proposes that a dialectic between plant and seed – and thus between entanglement and disentanglement – emerges, suggesting that rather than presenting a paradox, the practice of seed conservation might potentially foster a liminal, generative and experimental space within which new formations of human‐plant relationships might be nurtured.

Introduction: The Collection and Conservation of Plant Genetic Resources, Past and Present

“…Many more researchers give attention to seed savers and the roles they play (e.g., Nazarea, Rhoades, and Andrews‐Swann ; Pottinger ; Veteto ). Wild seed banking has yet to receive the same attention; yet its links to earlier imperial botanical endeavors (Chacko forthcoming) and the complexities of carefully stewarding wildness (Lewis‐Jones ) indicate the rich possibilities in this field.…”