THE INTERNATIONAL CONIFER CONSERVATION PROGRAMME

Conifers are among the world’s most threatened groups of plants yet contain some of the world’s most ecologically and economically important species. The work of the International Conifer Conservation Programme (ICCP), based at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, in helping to conserve some of the world’s most threatened conifers is discussed. Methods used by the ICCP include both in situ conservation (the preferred method, though not always the safest) and ex situ conservation. As part of the latter, the ICCP has developed a network of ‘safe sites’, where plants collected in the wild as seed or cuttings can be grown. Plants in ‘safe sites’ are carefully monitored and biological data recorded. ‘Safe sites’ are also a way to communicate conservation of threatened plants to the lay public. An example of this is the Chilean Temperate Rainforest Project at Benmore Botanic Garden, where threatened conifers from Chile are displayed in a re-creation of a Chilean temperate rainforest habitat.