Seeds carry stories of survival, culture and possibility. As part of her residency for Into the Seeds of Time, artist Vivienne Schadinsky spoke with Dr Tiziana Ulian, Senior Research Leader at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, about why our future may hinge on the smallest living things.
Working at the Millennium Seed Bank in Sussex - the world’s largest wild-plant seed vault - Ulian safeguards more than 40 000 species. Beans illustrate her mission: while most of us know just one domesticated species, the bank stores dozens of wild cousins whose genes could strengthen food security. Yet putting seeds on ice is only the starting point, she says; conservation must walk hand in hand with sustainable use.
That principle has guided Ulian’s decade-long Useful Plants Project across Mexico, Latin America and sub‑Saharan Africa. Seed-saving plans were co-designed with Indigenous and local communities, capturing everything from nutritious legumes to medicinal shrubs and building timbers. Training, trust-building and shared benefits were woven in from the outset, so scientific goals answered local needs.
Listening to farmers grounds a project socially and scientifically. Traditional knowledge about sowing dates, shade trees or soils often directs researchers to the precise germination temperatures or drought-hardy genes a lab later confirms. Ulian calls this fusion of innovation and inheritance “a winning match.”
The stakes could not be higher. Three crops - wheat, rice and maize - dominate global calories, while some 30 000 edible plants remain neglected. Diversifying our plates simultaneously diversifies, and thus protects, the ecosystems that feed us. Ulian’s recent work with shade-grown coffee cooperatives in Mexico shows the concept in action: planting native fruit and nitrogen-fixing trees boosts incomes, stores carbon and buffers yields against climate swings.
Behind every field plot lies painstaking seed science. Understanding the temperature windows that wake a seed, and how those thresholds may shift in a warming world, lets conservationists predict which species can be restored in future landscapes. Ulian’s team continually refines germination protocols so that banked seeds can return to living plants.
Policy frameworks matter too. Ulian points to the 2010 Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit‑Sharing, which requires researchers to return benefits (data, seedlings, royalties) to the communities whose knowledge and landscapes supply genetic resources. Every seed entering Kew’s vaults is covered by a detailed agreement, ensuring that conservation advances equity rather than extraction. The paperwork may be less romantic than a rainforest trek, she jokes, but it is what turns good intentions into lasting change. It also builds the government partnerships that keep projects funded and germinating long after researchers move on.
In the interview, Ulian speaks about building trust, negotiating with NGOs and governments, and aligning long‑term ecological goals with immediate human livelihoods. Her reflections preview how Into the Seeds of Time interweaves scientific data, field practice and artistry into a meditation on past, present and future. You can watch the full interview below: