![]() Most of the seeds, which could prove crucial to feeding millions of people as the world’s climate warms and deserts spread along with pests and diseases, are now in safe storage behind heavy steel doors, deep in a mountainside in Norway’s High Arctic. LONGYEARBYEN, NORWAY-In the middle of a savage civil war, a team of scientists in Syria has been quietly rescuing tiny bits of a global treasure: seeds with genetic roots running back to the beginning of civilization. You shouldn’t keep your eggs in one basket.” It’s for the smaller natural and political disasters that can strike gene banks around the world. Brazil has submitted historical documents like the Brazilian Constitution and Mexico has submitted important documents that date all the way back to the Inca period.“It’s not for Armageddon. Mexico and Brazil are the only countries that so far have submitted to the expanded vault. The Doomsday Seed Vault has been built In cooperation with major genetic engineering agribusiness giants such as DuPont and Syngenta Samples of wheat, barley, and grasses were sent to replace seeds in a gene bank in Aleppo that was damaged in the ongoing Syrian Civil war In 2015, the first withdrawal of seeds from the Global Seed Vault occurred. The Vault is the ultimate insurance policy for the world’s food supply, offering options for future generations to overcome the challenges of climate change and population growth. ![]() Some, including those of important grains, could survive far longer-possibly thousands of years. A feasibility study prior to construction determined that the vault could, for hundreds of years, preserve most major food crops’ seeds. Permafrost and thick rock ensure that the seed samples will remain frozen even without power. Seeds are packaged in special three-ply foil packets and heat sealed to exclude moisture. The facility is managed by the Nordic Genetic Resource Center, though there is no permanent staff on-site. The seedbank is 120 meters (390 ft) inside a sandstone mountain on Spitsbergen Island, and employs robust security systems. The Doomsday Seed Vault has been built deep inside Arctic mountainsĪnalog storage is generally considered more future proof than digital, and as long the internet and servers are still functioning, the data will remain searchable online in the event that the planet suffers some sort of catastrophic reset. Buried deep Inside a mountain, the Vault hopes to ensure survival of organic matter and archived data. The purpose of the Vault is to store duplicates (backups) of seed samples from the world’s crop collections. On 1 January 2008 the Nordic Gene Bank was integrated with NordGen. Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Iceland’s prime ministers ceremonially laid “the first stone” on 19 June 2006. These data will be transferred to a special film that is designed to withstand significant wear and tear. Now a country can upload tests, images or audio-visual content to special servers. ![]() Now the Doomsday Vault has expanded and don’t only store seeds but archiving data using developed film. More than 10,000 seed samples of more than 2,000 cultivars for 300 species have since Map of Svalbardġ984 been deposed. The so-called World Arctic Archive has, since 1984, stored backup Nordic plant germplasm via frozen seeds in an abandoned coal mine at Svalbard. Many of these are, however, vulnerable, exposed for disasters as well as natural catastrophes and war. The World has already over 1,700 gene-banks holding collections of food crops for safekeeping.
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