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Revitalizing Native Flora
The Role of TTW in Seed Banking
By: M. Bissett
Did you know the rarest plant in the world is right here in Aotearoa? There’s only one kaikōmako manawatāwhi left in the wild and it’s on Manawatāwhi Island. Of course, that’s not a Guiness World Record to be proud of. Aotearoa has over 2,500 plants and more than 80% are endemic. But due to deforestation, agriculture, human activity, and the taking of seeds and plants to put in gardens, more than 15% of our plants are threatened and 30% more are at risk. That’s a massive problem.
One way to save these taonga is through seed banking. Seed banking is a process of safeguarding plants in the event of a catastrophe or disease that could threaten the plants, and seed banks are the purpose-built storage facilities that house those seeds, keeping them safe and ready to germinate in case the plant dies out in the wild, or there is a need to improve genetic diversity in a population because of disease or a catastrophe including climate change.
To illustrate the value of seed banks, in 2005 an extinct Judean date palm was grown from a 2,000-year-old seed, and in 2012 the DNA from a 32,000-year-old seed from Siberia was used to grow a plant. In 2015 researchers made the first withdrawal from the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway which provides secure long-term storage for duplicates of the world’s crop diversity. The withdrawal was made to replace seeds in a gene bank near the Syrian city of Aleppo that had been damaged by the war.
So, does Aotearoa have a seed bank to protect our seed stocks? Well Yes and No. The Margot Forde Genebank is New Zealand’s national seed bank of grassland plants, and it hosts the New Zealand Indigenous Flora Seed Bank (NZIFSB) which is focused on collecting and conserving New Zealand’s indigenous flora, particularly plants that are at risk, such as the pohutukawa and rata because of the arrival of myrtle rust. There are also informal seed banks and seed exchanges that are run by businesses, community groups, and Iwi and hapū. Most focus on food crops but others conserve our indigenous plants for restoration projects.
Unfortunately, the seed banks we have in Aotearoa face several issues:
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Firstly, they lack the funding needed to maintain the facilities to a standard that is needed and or is respectful of the plants in their care.
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Secondly, they lack the level of funding required to undertake the research needed to fully prepare for the impacts of climate change.
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Thirdly, they lack the people power to collect enough seeds and enough trained people to manage the banks.
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Fourth, they struggle to engage with communities and Māori appropriately, which means they struggle to support community seed collecting efforts, and to target species of importance to communities, and importantly, they struggle to uphold their Treaty obligations.
Kōtukutuku Flower
None of this is surprising to us at Te Tira Whakamātaki, after all we’ve been advocating for more investment in seed banking and in Māori-led seed banking since 2017 when myrtle rust hit our shores. Why Māori-led? Well, Māori-led seed banking is not about practices or resources that are exclusively for Māori, rather it is about ensuring our seed banking practices prevent the appropriation of genetic resources and empower communities to maintain sovereignty and control over their seeds. It’s about safeguarding local food security for all people and future generations. It’s also about preserving traditional practices, acknowledging that Māori hold deep intergenerational knowledge of native plant species, ecosystems, and cultivation practices that are integral for effective and adaptive conservation here in Aotearoa.
Effectively it's an approach to seed banking that moves us away from the colonial processes that saw seed and plant collecting expand across the globe between the 16th and 19th centuries, leading to the commercialisation of plant varieties and the reinforcement of power imbalances between institutions that have become centres of authority and have gained economically from seeds, and communities who were the original holders of these seeds and require them for their survival.
More broadly, conservation, including seed banks, should be led by Indigenous People because evidence shows that the areas of the globe that are cared for by Indigenous Peoples are in a much better environmental state than almost of the rest of the world. The World Bank has shown that although Indigenous Peoples make up only 5% of the world’s population, they protect 80% of the biodiversity that remains.
In Aotearoa, we as Māori are the kaitiaki of our taiao. We are intimately connected to our whenua, our forests and birds, our plants and seeds. They are our whānau. They are taonga. Without them our mana and mauri are diminished. As a result, we here at Te Tira Whakamātaki have created a seed banking model. Rito ki te Rau (the Hub and Spoke), aims to empower local communities to manage and maintain their seeds, and gives them mana motuhake over the seeds that are stored in their rohe or takiwa (region). This approach acknowledges that each hapū, marae, whānau knows their whenua and should be choosing which seeds to preserve. They know which varieties grow well and in what conditions. They know which species are struggling. They know what they need to restore their whenua and wai, and they know the history of the seeds from that place.
Rito ki te rau is a bottom-up approach, meaning that seeds will flow from drum kits at home, the marae, in the community, to regional seed labs that might cater to multiple hapū or Iwi, and in turn to a national seed bank. Our dream is to see a drum kit at each marae. A kit that allows their community to collect, store and propagate seeds needed in the mara (garden) and in restoration efforts. The drums are like the tyre of the wheel. The dream extends to seeing small regional labs established across the country. Labs that can receive seeds from communities for longer storage and or much needed research to understand their storage and propagation needs, and the potential impacts from climate change on them. The labs are like the spokes of a wheel, they could be attached to a botanic garden or an Iwi nursery. Finally, our dream is to see the establishment of a purpose built, Māori-led National Seed Bank, otherwise known as the hub of the wheel. This hub could be multiple seed banks including the Margot Forde Genebank, but there is a real need for a new, fully funded one that upholds the promises of Te Tiriti. Seeds will be stored here long-term in accordance with tikanga Māori. New Zealanders will be trained here so we have generations of seed scientists. A living library of taonga plants will be housed here, allowing for further research and preservation.
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Te Tira Whakamātaki Delivering Seed Drums to Marae
The Rito ki te Rau model aims to ensure tangata whenua are making decisions about their taonga, at both the local and national levels. It adjusts the focus of seed banking in Aotearoa from commercial gain to mokopuna-based decision-making, allowing for a seed conservation strategy to include protecting our people and places from the impacts of climate change, and ensuring future New Zealanders (our mokopuna) can benefit from our plants and seeds also. It also provides jobs at local, regional, and national levels, promotes STEM and provides places for training the next generation about the environment, and by including mātauranga Māori supports the bringing together of knowledge systems that compliment and benefit each other. It is our belief that this model will set Aotearoa up as a world leader in seed conservation, particularly seed banking, and protect the vital ecosystems we need to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, systems vital for the world as it aims to avoid climate catastrophe and preserve taonga for our mokopuna.
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