There are many reasons why humans would want to store and preserve in a ‘Noah’s ark’ the rich variety of agricultural species on planet Earth. The first is that a third of crop biodiversity has been lost in the last century. Second, the fact that agriculture is suffering from a global crisis. As the last IPCC report of experts on climate change already reported, we will have to change the way we use the soil, and therefore our diet, if we want to try to alleviate the anthropological effects of climate change.
In addition, there are several disastrous scenarios that could make all or a large part of the world population need a food supply : climate refugees, a nuclear war, natural disasters … As if that were not enough, the so-called vault of the end of the world facilitates the study of crop genetics.
The function of the Svalbard World Bank is precisely to preserve all the seeds of the Earth, with all the objectives described above. The idea for the ambitious project was born in the late 1990s, and its promoters were a group of farmers and geneticist Cary Fowler. But a decade still had to pass until the start-up of its facilities, in 2008. By 2019, the number of seeds stored exceeded one million, coming from more than 200 countries.
Some other national seed banks, like those in Afghanistan and Iraq, for example, were destroyed by looters interested in the plastic containers in which the seeds were kept. And in the Philippines, a typhoon broke through a seed bank wall and destroyed many of the samples. For this reason, the place chosen for its construction had to be as remote as possible: the Arctic Circle, in the Svalbard archipelago (Norway). The motives? The place is at about -5ºC and it is also one of the corners with the fewest recorded earthquakes on the planet. Safety is optimal there: more than 150 meters below the permafrost , the entrance tunnel to the seed chamber is designed to withstand explosions and earthquakes. In addition, an automated system provides great security to effectively restrict entry to authorized personnel.
Temperature is essential for the preservation of the seeds. In addition to the low temperatures that exist there, the warehouse itself has a refrigeration system; however, if it failed, the seeds would not be in danger.
Why are seeds important?
As the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) explains, seeds are essential because they store the genetic information of agricultural species .
In fact, the seed was one of the most important evolutionary advances about 375 million years ago , much like the egg in animals, since it allowed plants to grow without the need to be next to a water source. Before seed, plants reproduced by spores, which need a lot of water to grow. But the seed, which is an embryonic plant, can survive away from water for months or years, carrying within it the nutrients it needs.
Conserving the seeds allows for a kind of embryonic backup of all the crops on the planet, ensuring that they do not become extinct, and at the same time having a constant source of food.
When the Earth is uninhabitable, perhaps the future of the vault of the end of the world will be to occupy a place in a ship that transports humanity to another planet, thus being able to serve as food on the long journey.
Images: wikiCommons
