|
Colombia is participating in one of the world's most ambitious
projects. Known as the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, the project
aims to preserve, safe from any catastrophe, humanity's agricultural
heritage.
As a service to the global community, the Norwegian Government
constructed a huge vault to preserve the world's plant germplasm
from any potential disaster—hence the media's nicknames
"Doomsday Vault" and "Noah's Ark". This
polar fortress, built near the town of Longyearbyen, is buried
deep in the bowels of a sandstone mountain on Spitsbergen
Island, in the remote archipelago of Svalbard, Norway, near
the North Pole (giving the vault yet another name: "Arctic
Seed Vault"). The vault is at the end of a 120-meter
tunnel that sits at 130 m above sea level, safe from rising
sea levels. The site was chosen for its tectonic stability,
permafrost (which will keep samples frozen, should electricity
fail), and remoteness from areas suffering socio-political
instability. Operations will be funded by the Global Crop
Diversity Trust, an international NGO based in Rome.
Although probably 1.5 million distinct seed samples of agricultural
crops currently exist, the vault can hold as many as 4.5 million
samples. Eventually, it will house every variety of almost
all the world's important food crops. The idea is to guarantee
food production for humanity for centuries and against the
possibilities of regional or global catastrophes. The protected
crops will include ancestral crops such as barley, beans,
lentils, maize, rice, sorghum, and wheat; forages; and agroforestry
plants. Scientists regard these collections as treasures because,
from them, they can develop new varieties with improved characteristics
such as higher yields, increased nutritional value, resistance
to pests and diseases, and the ability to survive changing
climatic conditions.
In late January 2008, seeds were shipped from different parts
of the planet to Longyearbyen in time for the vault's official
inauguration on 26 February 2008. Colombia is sending more
than 200,000 accessions. Of these, more than 65,000 will be
duplicates of those currently conserved in the gene bank at
the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT),
one of 15 centers that form part of the Consultative Group
on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). The Center
is considered as holding the world's largest and most diverse
collections of beans, cassava, and tropical forages, including
varieties that are already extinct in their places of origin.
The collections originate not only from Latin America, but
also from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.
Through its Genetic Resources Unit, CIAT has supported scientists
and farmers across five continents for more than 4 decades,
distributing more than 500,000 germplasm materials. The Unit
has also participated in humanitarian campaigns to help alleviate
famines caused by disasters such as the Rwandan Civil War
and Hurricane Mitch in Honduras and Nicaragua, where bean
fields were wiped out in their entirety.
CIAT will first send 30,912 accessions to Svalbard, consisting
of beans (21,699) and tropical forages (9,213). "This
shipment, representing about half of our current holdings,
will be the first of four", said Daniel Debouck, director
of the Genetic Resources Unit. "Except for some Caribbean
islands and the Guianas, every Latin American country will
have duplicates of their germplasm in the Arctic Seed Vault",
added Debouck.
Geoff Hawtin, Interim Director General of CIAT and former
executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, rates
the Svalbard Global Seed Vault as vital to the better protection
of food crop collections. "With coming climate changes,
higher food prices, and expanding markets for biofuels, our
best available options for progress, if not survival, lie
in what we have conserved and studied, often against all conceivable
predictions", said Hawtin.
The shipment from Colombia was packed in 93 boxes, built
especially for this purpose. They weighed a total of 1310
kg. Their journey began on 1 February 2008, leaving Cali for
Bogotá and Madrid to arrive in Oslo. After a 2-day
wait, and a special 5-hour flight, these agricultural jewels
from Latin America will arrive at their final destination:
a vault in Svalbard that may well help guarantee humanity's
future survival.
Contact: Dr Daniel G. Debouck, Director, Genetic Resources
Unit, International Center for Tropical Agriculture, Cali,
Colombia. E-mail: d.debouck@cgiar.org;
phone: +57 (2) 4450000 (ext. 3039).
Email
Page Link to a Friend
|
