Draft:Custode dei Semi

Custode dei Semi (the seeds’ keeper) is a type of farmer in Italy, Tuscany, who provides for the on-site conservation of genetic resources at risk of extinction.

Description
They are also called Custodian Farmers and they are committed to the conservation of the original seeds of the many different species, to return to natural agricultural products.

Farmers who want to become Custodians are paid by the Region of Tuscany and are entrusted with the protection, as well as the perpetuation of varieties of seeds that are at risk of extinction. due to the current industrialized practices of agriculture, which see seeds and their cultivation as something that needs to be controlled and regulated.

The seeds produced and sold by large multinationals in the agriculture sector are mainly hybrid, that is they are derived from a sexual cross of two parental plants and create a hybrid plant with specific desirable traits. This process allows the creation of plants with specific characteristics and gain more control over the reproduction of the seed. Furthermore, these types of seeds are not reproducible, thus forcing the farmer to make a new purchase with each sowing.

Method
Differently from other methods of cultivating, the one employed by the Custodian Farmers, also called seed saving, happens on-site; thus, one fundamental of this type of agriculture is the conservation of the seed in its ecosystem and natural environment. Custodian farmers’ goal is to protect agro-biodiversity ; the maintenance and recovery of specific varieties of seeds is at the heart of this movement, which is why each region focuses on growing seed species typical of the environment of that part of the territory.

Tuscany is not the only place in the world that encourages seed-saving, but it is one of the Regions in which I Custodi dei Semi are becoming more and more present.

Custodian Farmers can obtain specific varieties of seeds from the seed bank, also called gene banks, around the territory. However, if anything were to happen to those banks, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) created the Svalbard Global Seed Vault which serves as an archiving facility, located in a safe and secure place, to collect duplicate seeds of the world's major crops in case the original ones were lost