Seeds of Growth international meeting and Semínkovna 2026 conference, Prague, October 2026
This presentation by Chiara Brusatin (Rete Semi Rurali) shares experiences from the EC-LLD network on how a community seed bank (CSB) can connect with its local community and territory. It outlines EC-LLD’s mission to promote dynamic on-farm management of cultivated biodiversity through policy engagement, community seed bank support, and community networking. The slide deck presents Rete Semi Rurali’s CSB (Diversitas), operational tools (including manuals on establishment, documentation, and access/benefit sharing), participatory approaches, and practical guidance on seed drying, storage and quality. The Florentine Organic District is used as a concrete example of interpreting cultivated biodiversity as a commons: a multi-actor process that led to regional recognition, increased organic area and species counts, and the launch of a local Grain Chain to reintroduce organic cereals via evolutionary populations. The presentation emphasises multi-actor co-design, participatory plant breeding, documentation systems, and replicability lessons: build stable alliances between public bodies and civic networks, ground choices in local data, put seeds at the centre, and use existing legal and funding tools. Contact information for the presenter (chiara.brusatin@semirurali.net) is provided.
Key topics: community seed banks, agrobiodiversity, participatory plant breeding, seed commons, local food systems, seed documentation, Rete Semi Rurali
