Background, application opportunity

Background

The traditional task of herb gardens is to supply university education and research with plant material and to present plant diversity.

In recent decades, as a result of the degradation of natural habitats, more and more habitats have been endangered, which has led to the endangerment of many plant species and populations. Species that were previously declared protected have become even more vulnerable through these processes. Herb gardens have an ever-increasing role in their preservation. In the framework of so-called ex situ conservation, the gardens create a population from breeding mothers from natural habitats. In isolated conditions, they examine the growth, reproduction, and sometimes genetic characteristics of plants, as well as the possibilities of possible hybridization.

Based on all these preliminary tests, the specific species is propagated in the propagation greenhouse in the herb garden and then in the breeding garden. An important step in ex situ conservation is establishing and maintaining the appropriate number of individuals of a species. The stock created in this way contributes to the maintenance of the gene set of the given species and can be a source of additional breeding material

In accordance with the needs of national parks, ex situ propagated plants can be used to stabilize the number of individuals of populations living in natural conditions, i.e. ex situ conservation by herb gardens is a nature conservation activity, one of the more and more frequently used means of maintaining plant diversity and species conservation.

Application opportunity

Hungarian herb gardens mostly function as units of higher education institutions, their funding, due to the peculiarities of the algorithm providing support for education, only ensured survival, there were no resources for collection development, preservation of biological diversity and the implementation of the new task, ex situ conservation.

Recognizing the need for support, a special intervention group deals with the above area in the New Hungary Development Plan, and one of the strategic goals of the action plan drawn up by the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Water Affairs aims to strengthen ex situ protection. For the implementation of the plans, the European Regional Development Fund and the Republic of Hungary co-finance in a ratio of 75-15 % the Environmental and Energy Operational Program Good management of our natural values, adopted for the period 2008-2010. within the framework of a call for tenders (KEOP-3.1.3). The application supports the development of an appropriate infrastructure for collection maintenance and ex situ preservation, and the reconstruction of special habitats.