Svalbard Global Seed Vault Receives 70th Seed Deposit

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault opened its gates for its 70th deposit event, securing more than 15,000 duplicate seed samples from 11 genebanks across Asia, America, Europe, and Africa. This latest addition pushes the total number of seed samples safely stored in the Arctic facility past 1.4 million. Managed collaboratively by Norway, the Crop Trust, and NordGen, the "Doomsday" vault serves as the world's ultimate backup facility to safeguard global agricultural biodiversity and future food security.

The June deposit highlighted immense crop diversity and marked historic milestones for several participating nations. Genebanks from Brazil, Burkina Faso, Morocco, the Netherlands, Niger, Poland, South Korea, Sudan, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, and the United States deposited seeds. Two institutions, the national genebanks of Burkina Faso (CONAGREP) and Niger (INRAN), deposited seeds for the first time. CONAGREP deposited regional staples, including delivered samples of okra, maize, groundnut, hibiscus, pearl millet, rice, sesame, sorghum, bambara groundnut, and cowpea. South Korea's Rural Development Administration provided the largest shipment with 6,000 seed samples from 50 species, including cereals, vegetables, and legumes. Notably, despite severe disruptions from an ongoing civil war, Sudan's national genebank successfully shipped 982 samples of 19 different crops through emergency international support.

This event also represented a symbolic passing of the torch for NordGen's operational team on-site. The deposit served as the final event for retiring Seed Vault Coordinator Åsmund Asdal, who has managed the facility since 2015, and the first for incoming coordinator Fuad Gaši. Reflecting on his decade of service, Asdal emphasized that the facility remains a vital symbol of global unity, proving that international cooperation is still entirely possible in a fractured world.

For more details about the June deposit, read the article on the NordGen website.