News published: 11 April 2023

Fort Worth, TX – The Global Genome Initiative for Gardens (GGI-Gardens), Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI), and the United States Botanic Garden (USBG) are pleased to announce 10 awards to botanic gardens and arboreta in 10 countries to collect and conserve plant diversity. The GGI-Gardens Awards Program supports activities to preserve Earth’s genomic biodiversity of plants through sampling of living collections maintained at botanic gardens around the world.

The awardees will collect genome-quality plant tissue samples from their living plant collections and preserve them in Global Genome Biodiversity Network (GGBN) biobanks, making them accessible to researchers around the world. Priority was given to awardees that can collect unique families and genera of vascular plants not yet represented in GGBN biorepositories. The supported projects will sample from a wide range of genera from the arid-adapted Anabasis of the steppes and semi-deserts of India to the monotypic Wittmackanthus of tropical South and Central America.

“The GGI-Gardens community is grateful to BGCI and the U.S. Botanic Garden for their support of this award program. We are excited for this opportunity to build upon the success of the 2021 GGI-Gardens Partner Award program” Dr. Morgan Gostel, Director of GGI-Gardens and Research Botanist at the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT), noted. “Botanic gardens are on the front lines of conservation genomics and this program is building capacity to support these efforts at a critical time for biodiversity worldwide.”

“BGCI’s mission is to mobilise botanical expertise to support efforts to preserve and understand plant diversity,” said Dr. Paul Smith, Secretary General of BGCI. “We are grateful for the collaboration with GGI-Gardens and the United States Botanic Garden, which enables the success of this program.”

“The work of these gardens to preserve plant specimens and their genomic information is important protection against the increasing threats of habitat loss and climate change,” said Dr. Susan K. Pell, Executive Director of USBG. “We are proud to collaborate with GGI-Gardens and BGCI to enable these efforts supporting plant conservation and future research.”

Applications from institutions located in 16 countries were evaluated on institutional capacity, collection scope and genomic novelty, best practices, policies and biodiversity standards, efficiency, and broader conservation impacts.

The 10 awards, totalling nearly USD 35,000, were made possible by GGI-Gardens and the USBG, and administered through BGCI’s Global Botanic Garden Fund. Award recipients will carry out the collection activities and finalize projects by the end of 2024.  More information on the awarded projects will be provided throughout the year ahead.

The recipients of the 2023/2024 Awards Program grants are:

For more information on the GGI-Gardens Awards Program visit: www.bgci.org.

Contacts:

Morgan Gostel, GGI-Gardens, mgostel@brit.org
Devin Dotson, USBG, ddotson@aoc.gov
Rebecca Hansell, BGCI, rebecca.hansell@bgci.org