[Science News] - The contribution of Meise Botanic Garden to ensuring global food security
16 October marks the World Food Day, an international day celebrated every year throughout the world to commemorate the founding of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in 1945. The FAO was established as an international forum to tackle hunger and malnutrition. With 195 members - including 194 countries and the European Union - it operates from its headquarters in Rome, Italy, and maintains regional and field offices in over 130 countries, including one in Brussels.
Safeguarding and discovering plant and fungal diversity is crucial to ensuring food security and for a long time now is central to the mission of the Botanic Garden. Our institution has a long tradition of discovering, preserving and cultivating plants and fungi that are of interest for consumption. The discovery of chicory in the early 19th century, for example, is attributed to Franciscus Bresiers, a gardener of the Botanic Garden, at that time based in Brussels. In the late 1980s, the Botanic Garden acquired one of the most diverse collections of Phaseoleae beans, including the common bean, which remains preserved and studied in Meise with over 3000 accessions representing more than half of the bean species from South-America, Africa and Asia.
Research and conservation of plant and fungal genetic resources are even today a central topic in the Botanic Garden, covering various projects like the valorization of wild edible mushrooms in Africa, conserving and regenerating bananas from Southeast Asia, screening beans in Burundi and identifying wild coffee species in DR Congo. This multidisciplinary work encompasses various research topics, ranging from describing new species to assessing the ecological and agronomical characteristics. Perhaps the most important aspect of our research is to share this knowledge with local students, partners and farmers, either via capacity building or by providing easily and freely accessible resources (e.g. manuals, research papers, books, databases, etc.).
The ongoing work of Meise Botanic Garden thus plays an essential role in promoting global food security by preserving biodiversity and sharing knowledge.