Seed bank to help preserve the world’s plant species

Deep within a hollowed out Arctic mountain the Svalbard Global Seed Vault has opened for deposits. Just like a regular savings bank, this ‘vault’ will take deposits and keep them for a ‘rainy day’.

It is hoped that this new bank, funded by the Norwegian government will eventually stockpile over 100 million seeds from 100 different countries. These seed sample deposits will range from the world’s major crops like wheat, rice and corn, to lettuce cabbage and potatoes.

The bank is aiming to be easily the most diverse and comprehensive depository of agricultural crop seeds, anywhere in the world. Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai placed samples of over 100 varieties of rice into the bank, as a ceremonial first deposit.

The bank is located at Longyearbyen on the remote island of Spitsbergen. Each sample stored in the vault will originate from different farms, or even different fields around the world, to ensure total biodiversity.

The opening of the seed vault is part of an unprecedented effort to protect the planet’s rapidly diminishing biodiversity.

This diversity is considered to be the absolute essential to maintain what is known as a “fail-safe” selection of the world’s crops. This is essential to safeguard against potential global, or localised, natural, or man-made disasters.

The vault is predicted to be able to store the seed samples for several centuries and in what the designers prefer to as a ‘worst case scenario’ of global climate change. It will still be able to keep the seeds in perfect condition for up to 200 years.

Norway’s Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg in a speech at the opening ceremony said: “With climate change and other forces threatening the diversity of life that sustains our planet, Norway is proud to be playing a central role in creating a facility capable of protecting what are not just seeds, but the fundamental building blocks of human civilization,”

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault was fully funded by Norway as what they call a ‘service to the world’