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From War Zones to Typhoon-Prone Shores, Nations Rally to Protect Their Crops, Make Landmark Deposits to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault
Photos, b-roll and captions
Partner organizations from across the globe are gathering in Norway this week to deposit seeds in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, with Sudan making a deposit amid the country’s ongoing civil war
Longy...
25 Feb 2025
Zimbabwe’s Crop Diversity Secured in Svalbard
Sofia ran her hand through a bowl of traditional rice seeds from some nearby farms. “Where should I place this?” she asked her fellow members of the Chimukoko Community Seed Bank. The farmers were identifying and sorting popular...
24 Feb 2025
Plan B for Backup: Sweetpotato Seeds Go to Svalbard
There’s a sweetpotato variety in Papua New Guinea called “Gimane.” But farmers prefer to call it “I don’t care.” Gimane earned this name because it doesn’t care – it grows well with almost no inputs, making it a hassle-free crop....
19 Feb 2025
Safeguarding Indonesian Crop Diversity: A Q&A with Standy Christianto
The Borneo Institute Foundation (BIT) was founded in 2007 to support the independence and culture of Indonesia’s Dayak community. Based in Central Kalimantan, a region rich in biodiversity, BIT works with farmers in the Manuhing...
12 Feb 2025
Alta Sierra Alfalfa Gives High Hopes to Farmers in the Atacama Desert and Beyond
“Alfalfa is what our livelihoods depend on, what our animals eat. It is important for my family now, and it was for former generations – double the value,” says Mauricio Moyo, a smallholder farmer in the Putre region of Chile’s At...
27 Nov 2024
The New York Times: The World’s Doomsday Plant Vault Gets Thousands of New Seeds
The world’s seed savers are racing to safeguard the world’s crop diversity in “the world’s doomsday garden shed,” writes Amelia Nierenberg in her The New York Times report of the final 2024 depositor event at the Svalbard Global...
29 Oct 2024
Svalbard Global Seed Vault Historic Deposit Bolsters Food Security Amid Crises
LONGYEARBYEN, SVALBARD, October 23, 2024 - The Svalbard Global Seed Vault received yesterday a deposit of more than 30,000 new seed samples from 23 depositors across 21 countries, including seven international genebanks. This...
23 Oct 2024
400-Year-Old Bolivian Newcomer Ships Seeds to Svalbard
A 400-year-old university in Bolivia is set to become the latest depositor to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, thanks to support from the Government of Norway, channeled through the Crop Trust.
Founded in 1624, the Universidad...
21 Oct 2024