Tag Archive for 'Svalbard Global Seed Vault'

Svalbard Seed Vault Update

jackson published on February 4, 2008 in technology and zeitgeist. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .


(image via treehugger)

For those of you who read the Dec. 6/07 post about the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, here’s an update. It seems as though the first shipment of seeds are now making their way to the Vault. Once there, they will help to ensure the survival of indeginous plant species for future Earthlings. Nothing wrong with that.

from treehugger:
“Twenty-one boxes filled with 7,000 unique seed samples from more than 36 African nations were shipped to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a facility being built on a remote island in the Arctic Circle as a repository of last resort for humanity’s agricultural heritage.

The shipment, which was sent by the Ibadan, Nigeria-based International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), consists of thousands of duplicates of unique varieties of domesticated and wild cowpea, maize, soybean, and Bambara groundnut. The seeds from the IITA genebank in Ibadan, Nigeria, were packed in 21 boxes weighing a total of 330 kg. The processing by IITA staff took several months, and the boxes were packaged over a three-day period, with 10 staff checking the accession list, reporting errors, and adjusting the inventory, as needed.”

Svalbard Global Seed Vault

jackson published on December 6, 2007 in food, technology and zeitgeist. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , .



Apparently, some folks are taking our rapidly changing climate seriously. Hence the construction of a seriously well thought out seed vault on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen near the town of Longyearbyen (population 1900) in the remote arctic Svalbard archipelago.

Think of it as a Noah’s Ark for plants.

From wikipedia:

“The Svalbard International Seed Vault’s mission is to store as many seeds known to humans as possible, under the terms of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. The goal is to prevent important agricultural and wild plants from becoming rare or extinct in the event of a global disaster such as global warming, a meteorite strike, nuclear or biological warfare, or gene pollution from transgenic plants. There are already over 1400 local seedbanks around the world, but many are in politically unstable or environmentally threatened nations. When this seedbank is built, the vault will be secure and isolated from much of the world’s population.”

It’s nice to know it will be there. Let’s hope we don’t have to rely on it.
Wait a second, I think we should immediately begin construction of our OWN seed vault! We cannot allow a seed vault gap!

Here’s their site: Svalbard Global Seed Vault