Blossoming future for Kew plant ark

LONDON - A pink banana marked a milestone yesterday, as Kew Gardens celebrated collecting the seeds of 10 per cent of the world's wild plants.

It is 24,200 down and 217,800 to go in what is perhaps the most ambitious botanical project anywhere - that of fending off the multiple threats of extinction hanging over the flowering plants of the world, of which 70 per cent are now at risk.

The banana in question, the Yunnan banana, Musa itinerans, found in Asia from China to India, is the 24,200th species to be conserved for Kew's Millennium Seed Bank. At the present pace, the project could be complete in 2109.

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