Food Forever Featured in BGjournal

BGjournal is the worldwide journal of botanic garden conservation published by Food Forever Partner Organization, Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI). The latest issue features an interview between Richard Deverell of London’s infamous Kew Gardens and Marie Haga of the Crop Trust. These two engage in an insightful conversation on the various ways botanic gardens contribute to implementing the Sustainable Development Goals – specifically SDG 2.5.

“Botanic gardens are places where people can lose themselves in the beauty of plants. But they are places that feed the mind too. Over 80% of our visitors tell us that they learn something during their visit to Kew Gardens, and I hope that all 100,000 school children we host on educational visits come away with new knowledge and a sense of wonder about the plant kingdom. At the most basic level, everyone needs food and therefore food is a great place to start a conversation about the importance of plants to their lives.”

Richard also explains personally why he chose to become a Champion of the Food Forever Initiative.

“When I first heard about the Food Forever Initiative, it made perfect sense to me. Global food security is, in my view, one of the most important issues that botanic gardens can help solve. Knowing that humanity relies on such a narrow stream of genetic diversity – consuming around 60% of our calories globally from just three species of plant the Initiative’s aim of raising awareness of biodiversity for the benefit of food security felt like something that I had to support.”

The full article is already available to BGCI members and will soon be available to all at this link.