This study presents the results of a comparative analysis of the fungal diversity in the world system of microbial culture collections on one side with a variety of known fungal producers on the other side. The main VKM databases used are FungalDC and Metabolites of Fungi and the central point of analysis is the fungal ability to synthesize promising metabolites for applied use. It indicates that the option of obtaining new promising strains from the collection funds is still underestimated by the scientific community. In particular, it is shown that no more than 3% of the total fungal species fund contained in culture collections are used practically. It is possible that their use will considerably expand the range of studied strains and lead to the acquisition of new scientifically significant data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]