Europe’s agricultural systems face intensifying risks from climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution, threatening food security and resilience. Seed diversity is critical to maintaining biodiversity and enabling climate adaptation. Current EU seed regulations can be improved to better support the management and exchange of seeds for conservation purposes in the EU. This brief, developed under the Horizon Europe PLANET4B project, examines how EU and national policies can better support community seed banks, participatory breeding, and informal seed exchange networks that conserve genetic resources and traditional knowledge.