275
submitted 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

As Cary Fowler and Geoffrey Hawtin began thinking about ways to prevent starvation and protect the world’s food supply, they came up with what Fowler called “the craziest idea anybody ever had” — a global seed vault built into the side of an Arctic mountain

About 20 years ago, Fowler, now the U.S. special envoy for Global Food Security, and Hawtin, an agricultural scientist from the United Kingdom, envisioned the so-called “doomsday vault” as a backup spot for seeds that could be used to breed new crops if existing seed banks were threatened by wars, climate change or other upheaval. On Thursday, officials in Washington announced that Fowler and Hawtin would be named 2024 World Food Prize laureates for their work.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault on the Norwegian island of Svalbard opened in 2008 and now holds 1.25 million seed samples from nearly every country. The largely concrete structure, built into the side of a mountain, provides genetic protection for over 6,000 varieties of crops and culturally important plants.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works 2 points 6 months ago

Even if the Arctic melts im pretty sure Svaldbard is far enough north it shouldnt matter too much. So even if the Arctic melts completely it sbould be fjne still, plus im pretty sure its dug in underground enough that underground cooling also kicks in.

this post was submitted on 10 May 2024
275 points (98.6% liked)

News

23296 readers
1308 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS