NordGen

The Nordic Genetic Resource Center

NordGen is the Nordic countries’ regional genebank and knowledge centre for genetic resources. Their mission is to safeguard the Nordic genetic resources and facilitate their sustainable use for agriculture, horticulture, and forestry - for current and future generations.

Organized under the Nordic Council of Ministers, NordGen has three sectors working with plants, farm animals and forests. The plant section is responsible for the Nordic seed genebank which is safeguarding about 33,000 accessions composed by breeding lines, cultivars, landraces and crop wild relatives. NordGen is also maintaining a database for Nordic and Baltic genebank information called GeNBIS. NordGen’s head office is situated in the south of Sweden.

Role in PRO-GRACE

In PRO-GRACE, NordGen contributes to several different work packages: WP1 (Plant genetic resources inventory and information systems), WP2 (Quality-certified ex situ and in situ management), WP4 (Plant genetic resources evaluation and valorization), WP5 (Research Infrastructure concept, social and regulatory aspects, governance and financial plan) amd WP6 (Communication, dissemination, exploitation and training).

As the leader of deliverable D2.6, NordGen will help improve the current infrastructure for conservation and access to plant genetic resources by developing a system for their unique identification. The identification system will be based on both DOIs and DNA barcoding. NordGen will also be responsible for deliverable D5.4, which concerns the development of a concept for a novel European research infrastructure, where NordGen will provide a governance structure for the concept.