News

Luigi Guarino

Genebanks: what are they good for? While the answer is rarely the emphatic “Absolutely nothing!” of the anti-war song, ambivalence – or worse – about the usefulness of genebanks is expressed more often than one...

SYDNEY (22 October 2010)—Hoping to save the vulnerable varieties of bananas painted by the artist Paul Gauguin, rare coconuts, and 1,000 other unique varieties of staple fruit and vegetable crops across the Pacific, crop...

ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA (21 September 2010)—A global social media campaign to save Europe’s most important collection of fruits and berries has collected over 50,000 petition signatures worldwide. The campaign is part of a massive...

LONGYEARBYEN, NORWAY (11 March 2010)—Days after celebrating its second anniversary, the Svalbard “Doomsday” Global Seed Vault is receiving this week thousands of new seeds that will push its collection to more than half a million...

This fantastic TED talk brings people closer to understanding the importance of crop diversity.

Tucked away under the snows of the Arctic...

Longyearbyen, Norway (26 February 2008) The first seeds will be placed in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault at an opening ceremony on Tuesday, 26 February 2008. During the ceremony, thousands of crop varieties from countries around...

OSLO, NORWAY (9 February 2007)—The Norwegian government has revealed the architectural design for the Svalbard International Seed Vault, to be carved deep into frozen rock on an island not far from the North Pole. The entrance to...