The CBS culture collection of microorganisms is embedded in a scientific environment, which guarantees state of the art quality checks and allows the development of scientific programmes to improve the quality of the material entrusted to them. The collection department was actively involved in setting the standards for modern long-term preservation as well as for data storage, recognizing the necessity of data exchangeability. Already in the nineteen eighties common formats for microbial data were developed, which brought the collections to the forefront of digitalization, and greatly facilitated the development of a common catalogue realized in the EU programme CABRI (Common Access to Biotechnological Resources and Information (www.cabri.org). Collection curators were actively involved in setting up criteria and minimal demands for culture collections within the CABRI framework. As result of these efforts, the culture collections developed into a Biological Resource Centre (BRC) according to the OECD definition: Biological Resource Centres are an essential part of the infrastructure underpinning life sciences and biotechnology. They consist of service providers and repositories of the living cells, genomes of organism, and information relating to heredity and the functions of biological systems.The CBS collection department keeps the high standards of quality and expertise demanded by the international community of scientists and industry for the delivery of biological resources on which R&D in the life sciences and the advancement of biotechnology depends. Collections and related services are ISO 9001 certified. The CBS collection offers an unchallenged and comprehensive coverage of the culturable biodiversity of the fungal Kingdom (over 100,000 strains). Expert scientists of the Westerdijk Institute, the collection curators and a group of technicians fully dedicated to the preservation and supply services provided by the BRC, guarantee the quality of the strains and services in compliance with all relevant regulations concerning biosafety and biosecurity.