Domesticated plants gene-pools: direct ancestors, landraces and wild relatives.
Forage, forest and ornamental plants which can be used as source material for breeding.
Untapped potential for food-related, pharmacological and chemical industries.
Land conservation species.
The base collection at the ARO contains over 22,000 accessions belonging to
1085 species. Some 8,000 of these accessions were collected in Israel,
mainly from wild populations. In addition, there is a wide collection of landraces.
The bulk of the present holdings originates from 117 countries and includes core
accessions collected by the ARO's Department of Plant Introduction which
predated the IGB.
In addition to the seed bank, the
IGB
administers three other
ex-situ
germplasm collections, in which plants are
maintained vegetatively. These include a repository of
fruit-tree clones
as well as a
clonal collection of spice plants
, both at the ARO North Research Center at Newe Ya'ar,
and an internationally renowned
collection of short-day adapted Allium L. species
at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Faculty of Agriculture, Rehovot and Agricultural Research Organizastion, Volcani Center.
The
fruit-tree collection
consists of some 150 accessions of Almond, Plum, Peach, Apricot, and Apple,
as well as clones of Fig, Pomegranate, and Grapevine.
These clones originate from mixed orchards and vineyards dating to ancient
Israeli agricultural systems.
The
spice-plant collection
comprises some 800 accessions of species and varieties of Israeli and worldwide
origin and is used as a source for breeding and research. The largest
collections are those of species and cultivars of Artemisia or Wormwood,
Mint, Sage as well as wild accessions, hybrids and cultivars of
Origanum syriacum
L.,
Rosemarinus officinalis
L.,
Satureja thymbra
L., and
Thymus vulgaris
L.
The
Allium collection
at the Hebrew University and Volacani Center contains ca. 500 entries of garlic,
great-headed garlic, tropical and subtropical shallot and ~40
Allium
species growing wild in Israel
and neighbouring areas. In addition, the collection includes 246 accessions of Garlic,
A. sativum
, from over 30 countries.
