A seed vault at the North Pole. Very cool!

Work begins on Arctic seed vault. http://HYPERLINK@news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5094450.stm

Norway is starting construction on a "doomsday vault" in the Arctic which is designed to house all known varieties of the world's crops.
Dug into a frozen mountainside on the island of Svalbard, it is hoped the project will safeguard crop diversity in the event of a global catastrophe.

More than 100 countries have backed the vault, which will store seeds, packaged in foil, at sub-zero temperatures.

Prime Ministers from five nations helped lay the cornerstone on Monday.

Premiers from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland attended the ceremony near the town of Longyearbyen, in Norway's remote Svalbard Islands, roughly 1,000 km (620 miles) from the North Pole.

Secure facility

Norway's Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg told the Norwegian news agency NTB: "The vault is of international importance. It will be the only one of its kind; all the other gene banks are of a commercial nature."


Fenced in and guarded, with steel airlock doors, motion detectors and polar bears roaming outside - the concrete facility will, its backers say, be the most secure building of its type in the world.
Norway's Agriculture Minister Terje Riis-Johansen has called the vault a "Noah's Ark on Svalbard."

The vault's purpose is to ensure survival of crop diversity in the event of plant epidemics, nuclear war, natural disasters or climate change; and to offer the world a chance to restart growth of food crops that may have been wiped out.

At temperatures of minus 18C (minus 0.4F), the seeds could last hundreds, even thousands, of years. Even if all cooling systems failed, explained Mr Riis-Johansen, the temperature in the frozen mountain would never rise above freezing due to the permafrost on the mountainside.

Ultimate back-up

The Global Crop Diversity Trust, founded in 2004, will help run the vault, which is planned to open and start accepting seeds from around the world in September 2007. The bank is eventually expected to house some three million seeds.


"This facility will provide a practical means to re-establish crops obliterated by major disasters," Cary Fowler, executive secretary of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, said in a statement.
Fowler, who led a feasibility study on the project, said crop diversity was also threatened by "accidents, mismanagement, and short-sighted budget cuts".

Already, some 1,400 seed banks around the world, most of them national, hold samples of a country's crops. But these banks "can be affected by shutdowns, natural disasters, war or simply a lack of money," said Mr Riis-Johansen.

While Norway will own the vault itself, countries sending seeds will own the material they deposit - much as with a bank safe-deposit box. The Global Crop Diversity Trust will help developing countries pay the cost of preparing and sending seeds.

Great news!

Especially with all the mono-crop produce the international agro-giants promote. One or two plant blights will wipe out most - corn, wheat, rice, etc.

I don't know the name, but there is a huge wild-flower seed conservatory in western Colorado. As a boy in Utah, the rain that occurred in 1957, produced plants that reportedly, no white-man had ever seen. That seed bank had collectors all over the desert for several weeks. It had been many decades since that part of Utah had significant rain.

I'm wondering if -18C is a typo or could they have misheard?: Home freezers are often set that low, so -18C is not all that cold or impressive.

Most laboratories store important material at -70 to -85C. (-94 to -112F). Perhaps the author of the articicle heard -18 instead of the correct -80?

Or, maybe seeds do not have to be as cold as tissues to last hundreds of years? I'm just curious.

-18c is the same temperature the National Center for Genetic Resources Preservation in Fort Collins, Colorado uses for long-term storage of seed.

Wayne

Fascinating! Gives one hope!!!

Thanks Wayne, for supplying the name and location.

Has anyone heard anything more about this?

Cool! I had heard about this storage project some time ago and I'm glad it is coming to fruition.

Good deal!

I just read that Monsanto is a major shareholder of this project...

There are some very suspect sponsors of this

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7529

BB

YIKES!

I just read the entire article. At the risk of sounding political, it scares me almost to death, as has Terminator Technology from its beginning. One quote from the article really got my attention:
As Henry Kissinger declared in the 1970’s, ‘If you control the oil you control the country; if you control food, you control the population.’

I am neither a biologist or an attorney. Does anyone know if existing genecti material can be patented by a company? For example, can a company take the DNA of say, the Brandywine tomato and patent it?

BB

BB, I sure hope not. My understanding is that companies like Monsanto are genetically modifying the seed and THEN getting a patent on the new hybrid.

Last time I checked, there were 12 patents on Terminator Technology and the US Government owns half of them.

What's Terminator Technology?

BB,

Here is a dicionary definition. Perhaps if GM are used, it could just possibly limit their spread....not all bad. LBoH. Anyway, I don't think that the technology is being used for now.

There are plant patents for certain new varieties of plants....at least PVPs which are licensed to not allow the sale of these varieties by other growers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminator_Technology

Thanks

I had though that GMO efforts only dealt with giving or enhancing a plant specific properties. I had no idea that it was also being used to render the plant unable to reproduce after one breeding cycle. That's scary.

BB

My question, after a major holocost - who will be able to access the vaults???

Not you... and not me!


Monsanto

Boy

Does anyone else see the irony of Monsanto being a major sponsor of an effort to promote seed diversity?

BB

Sequee, you bring up a very good question!

BB, Monsanto can have seed diversity and still splice with terminator.

Kind og off-topic, but not totally:

[HYPERLINK@www.mustangmods.com]

Kinda on topic... I came across this yesterday.

Organic Seed Alliance is growing
http://www.ptleader.com/main.asp?SectionID=21&SubSectionID=21&ArticleID=19728&TM=83581.08

I like THAT notion MUCH better. Conglomerates controlling seed "purification" is just too darned scary. Yes, it will be a brave new world...and whomever suvives can then face genetically altered seeds - Hmmmm - I just don't think so...but thanks anyway!!!

I read a list of things that most people DON'T have (but should) in their "emergency" supplies. Vegetable seeds was one of the top things! Now this is of course in case of a massive catastrophic emergency, not just a three day power outage.

My husband joked that if something of that magnitude happened, I would be the most popular woman in town.

It certainly made me think about living in such a rural area. Lots of ranches around here, but not too many farms...

True. In prep for Y2K, I had looked at the sealed cans of seeds. The idea was good but the seed assortment was not, IMO.

I'm trying to get more heirloom seeds so I can save some...