The Botanic Garden is part of the Finnish Museum of Natural History, which is a national natural-history collection. Functions of the Botanic Garden are:

1. maintaining a collection of living plants for use in research and teaching
2. international seed exchange for scientific purposes
3. botanical research and teaching
4. public education on plants
5. coordinating the work of Finnish botanic gardens

The Botanic Garden’s work is based on its scientific plant collection in which the plant accessions are of known origin and thoroughly documented to serve research, teaching and education as well as possible.