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Rare chance for champion
Rare chance for champion
Rare Welsh plants have a new champion.
Natasha de Vere has joined the National Botanic Garden of Wales as Conservation Botanist. Her main role will be to develop conservation and research programmes to help protect rare and endangered plants in Wales.
Head of Education and Science at the Garden Trevor Roach said: “This is such an important appointment for the Garden. As well as being famous the world over as a fabulous place to visit, the Garden is working hard to cultivate its botanic credibility.
“Natasha’s role will put us back on the scientific map and her appointment signals us passing a crucial milestone.”
Natasha has spent the past six years working with the Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust, which owns three nature reserves and Paignton Zoo where she was the Conservation Officer, responsible for supporting field conservation in the UK and 10 other countries.
She said: “I am really excited to be here. A key component of the programmes I will be developing will help deliver the National Botanic Garden’s commitment to Target 8 of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation.”
The Global Strategy for Plant Conservation grew out of the Convention on Biological Diversity and is being fed into government policy around the world.
Natasha explained: “The GSPC highlights the importance of plants and the ecosystem services they provide for all life on earth, and aims to ensure their conservation.
“The Global Strategy has 16 targets, and the Garden will contribute to all of these. Target 8 in particular is a key area for us to develop; it states that 60% of threatened plant species will be grown in accessible ex situ collections, preferably in the country of origin, and 10% of them included in recovery and restoration programmes by 2010.”
Growing plant species ex situ in botanic gardens provides an important safety net in case they are lost from the wild and also provides a valuable opportunity to learn more about their biology, so that we can conserve them effectively.
