Geominero Museum: past, present and… the future?

[EN] The Geominero Museum is a public museum that currently depends on the IGME - CSIC National Centre. A valuable geological heritage made up of more than 100,000 specimens of fossils, minerals and rocks is kept by the Museum, whose origin dates back to the second half of the 19th century. Its objectives are to conserve, disseminate and research the richness and diversity of the palaeontological, mineralogical and petrological heritage from all Spanish regions, as well as from former Spanish colonies and some representative sites of the geological record of the world. From the 1990s until 2021, the Museum has worked in three areas: research, curation-restoration and education-dissemination. A vocational and consolidated staff has achieved to position the Museo Geominero among the national and international distinguished geological museums. However, as of Royal Decree 202/2021, 30th March, the Museum missed one of its main roles: research. The reduction in Geominero Museum staff, therefore the capacities to take on museum objectives are also reduced (see the definition of a Museum by International Council of Museums, ICOM), the current weakness of the synergies previously created between researchers, curators and disseminators and a lack of expertise staff on educational and dissemination activities, have led the Museum to become a mere exhibition space for exhibiting specimens. It does not seem a very promising future for a Museum that has been a main window to the world for such an emblematic, prestigious and a long and fruitful history institution as the Spanish Geological and Mining Institute (IGME).Peer reviewe