that members organize nation-by-nation landrace conservation did not succeed in leading to widespread conservation efforts. Landraces are often free from many intellectual property and other regulatory encumbrances. However, in some jurisdictions, a focus on their production may result in missing out on some benefits afforded to producers of genetically selected and homogenous organisms, including breeders' rights legislation, easier availability of loans and other business services, even the right to share seed or stock with others, depending on how favorable the laws in the area are to high-yield agribusiness interests. As Regine Andersen of the Fridtjof Nansen Institute (Norway) and the Farmers' Rights Project puts it, "Agricultural biodiversity is being eroded. This trend is putting at risk the ability of future generations to feed themselves. In order to reverse the trend, new policies must be implemented worldwide. The irony of the matter is that the poorest farmers are the stewards of genetic diversity." Protecting farmer interests and protecting biodiversity is at the heart of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (the "Plant Treaty" for short), under the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), though its concerns are not exclusively limited to landraces. Landraces played a basic role in the development of the standardized breeds but are today threatened by the market success of the standardized breeds. In developing countries, landraces still play an important role, especially in traditional production systems. Specimens within an animal landrace tend to be genetically similar, though more diverse than members of a standardized or formal breed. In situ and ex situ landrace conservation Two approaches have been used to conserve plant landraces: in situ where the landrace is grown and conserved by farmers on farms. ex situ where the landrace is conserved in an artificial environment such as a gene-bank, using controls such as laminated packets kept frozen at . As the amount of agricultural land dedicated to growing landrace crops declines, such as in the example of wheat landraces in the Fertile Crescent, landraces can become extinct in cultivation. Therefore ex situ landrace conservation practices are considered a way to avoid losing the genetic diversity completely. Research published in 2020 suggested that existing ways of cataloging diversity within ex situ genebanks fall short of cataloging the appropriate information for landrace crops. An in situ conservation effort to save the Berrettina di Lungavilla squash landrace made use of