Fresh stock takes 'doomsday vault' stock to a million seed samples

The world’s ‘doomsday vault’ received 60,000 seed samples on February 25, 2020. This took the stock to 1.05 million seeds, filling up a fourth of total capacity. The seeds came from 36 regional & international institutions. The Svalbard global seed vault is the world’s largest depository for safekeeping crop seeds. So that civilisation can restart in case there are climate disasters or national emergencies. After its start in 2008, the Cherokee Nation - among the United States’ first tribes - deposited 9 seed varieties, including the Cherokee White Eagle Corn, beans and squash. UK’s Prince Charles deposited 27 different wild plants, including cowslips and orchid. The vault, on a mountain near Longyearbyen on Spitsbergen Island, has more than
5,000 species. The cold Arctic climate will keep the vault cool even if there is a power cut. The vault’s utility was underscored when the first withdrawals were made. After the 2015 Syria civil war as seed banks in Aleppo were damaged.