SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Syrian War Forces First-Ever Withdrawal from Global Seed Vault
After armed conflict destabilized Aleppo gene bank, scientists withdraw seeds from Arctic repository in order to safeguard critical research
Oct 19, 2015
The ongoing armed conflict in Syria has forced scientists to withdraw seeds from the Arctic seed vault, safeguarding the world's food supply. The Crop Trust oversees the repository and confirmed Monday that this is the first time.
Buried in the remote Svalbard peninsula in the Arctic and designed to withstand rising sea levels, the vault was established eight years ago by the Norwegian government, the Crop Trust, and NordGen. It preserves roughly 860,000 samples from gene banks worldwide to fortify international supply in case of catastrophe.
The International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA)--an important gene bank based in Aleppo, Syria--was one of many worldwide that sent seeds to the Arctic for safekeeping.
"The seeds in ICARDA's care are a globally important collection with 65 percent as unique landraces and wild relatives of cereals, legumes, and forages collected from regions such as the 'Fertile Crescent' in Western Asia, the Abyssinian highlands in Ethiopia, and the Nile Valley where earliest known crop domestication practices were recorded in civilization," the Crop Trust explained in a statement released Monday.
However, due to ongoing war and conflict, research at the Aleppo facility has been destabilized.
"ICARDA managed to move its headquarters from Syria in the early days of the war, while some of its workers remained at the gene bank in Aleppo in an attempt to save the collection," the Crop Trust said last month. "The organization managed to duplicate 80 percent of its collection in Svalbard as of March this year, where the seeds were safely stored along with others from around the world."
So, ICARDA scientists asked the Svalbard vault to return their seed deposits to new research facilities in Lebanon and Morocco to allow them to continue their research.
"The gene bank in Aleppo is still operative, but the uncertain national situation impedes sufficient recultivation of seeds to meet the demand," explained an official statement from Norway's Ministry of Agriculture and Food. "ICARDA, therefore, has requested the Svalbard Global Seed Vault to return a large proportion of seed samples deposited there in a number of shipments since 2008, aiming to grow new seed supplies."
The Crop trust confirmed on Monday that 38,000 seed samples "were safely delivered to Morocco and Lebanon today, having undertaken a 10,000 kilometre roundtrip. These seeds could be key to developing new crop varieties crucial to meeting world food demands with climate change."
Meanwhile, ICARDA criticized media reports that the Aleppo facility is completely nonfunctional earlier this month, stating: "The security situation in Syria has significantly affected ICARDA's field-related activities. However, despite all difficulties, the storage facilities of its GeneBank are still operational."
"In one sense, it would be preferable if we never had to retrieve seeds from the Seed Vault, as a withdrawal signifies a significant problem elsewhere in the world," said Marta Haga, executive director of the Crop Trust. "However, we can now see that the Vault as the ultimate fail-safe works the way it was intended to do."
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Sarah Lazare
Sarah Lazare is the editor of Workday Magazine and a contributing editor for In These Times. She is a former Staff Writer at Common Dreams. She comes from a background in independent journalism for publications including The Intercept, The Nation, and Tom Dispatch.
The ongoing armed conflict in Syria has forced scientists to withdraw seeds from the Arctic seed vault, safeguarding the world's food supply. The Crop Trust oversees the repository and confirmed Monday that this is the first time.
Buried in the remote Svalbard peninsula in the Arctic and designed to withstand rising sea levels, the vault was established eight years ago by the Norwegian government, the Crop Trust, and NordGen. It preserves roughly 860,000 samples from gene banks worldwide to fortify international supply in case of catastrophe.
The International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA)--an important gene bank based in Aleppo, Syria--was one of many worldwide that sent seeds to the Arctic for safekeeping.
"The seeds in ICARDA's care are a globally important collection with 65 percent as unique landraces and wild relatives of cereals, legumes, and forages collected from regions such as the 'Fertile Crescent' in Western Asia, the Abyssinian highlands in Ethiopia, and the Nile Valley where earliest known crop domestication practices were recorded in civilization," the Crop Trust explained in a statement released Monday.
However, due to ongoing war and conflict, research at the Aleppo facility has been destabilized.
"ICARDA managed to move its headquarters from Syria in the early days of the war, while some of its workers remained at the gene bank in Aleppo in an attempt to save the collection," the Crop Trust said last month. "The organization managed to duplicate 80 percent of its collection in Svalbard as of March this year, where the seeds were safely stored along with others from around the world."
So, ICARDA scientists asked the Svalbard vault to return their seed deposits to new research facilities in Lebanon and Morocco to allow them to continue their research.
"The gene bank in Aleppo is still operative, but the uncertain national situation impedes sufficient recultivation of seeds to meet the demand," explained an official statement from Norway's Ministry of Agriculture and Food. "ICARDA, therefore, has requested the Svalbard Global Seed Vault to return a large proportion of seed samples deposited there in a number of shipments since 2008, aiming to grow new seed supplies."
The Crop trust confirmed on Monday that 38,000 seed samples "were safely delivered to Morocco and Lebanon today, having undertaken a 10,000 kilometre roundtrip. These seeds could be key to developing new crop varieties crucial to meeting world food demands with climate change."
Meanwhile, ICARDA criticized media reports that the Aleppo facility is completely nonfunctional earlier this month, stating: "The security situation in Syria has significantly affected ICARDA's field-related activities. However, despite all difficulties, the storage facilities of its GeneBank are still operational."
"In one sense, it would be preferable if we never had to retrieve seeds from the Seed Vault, as a withdrawal signifies a significant problem elsewhere in the world," said Marta Haga, executive director of the Crop Trust. "However, we can now see that the Vault as the ultimate fail-safe works the way it was intended to do."
Sarah Lazare
Sarah Lazare is the editor of Workday Magazine and a contributing editor for In These Times. She is a former Staff Writer at Common Dreams. She comes from a background in independent journalism for publications including The Intercept, The Nation, and Tom Dispatch.
The ongoing armed conflict in Syria has forced scientists to withdraw seeds from the Arctic seed vault, safeguarding the world's food supply. The Crop Trust oversees the repository and confirmed Monday that this is the first time.
Buried in the remote Svalbard peninsula in the Arctic and designed to withstand rising sea levels, the vault was established eight years ago by the Norwegian government, the Crop Trust, and NordGen. It preserves roughly 860,000 samples from gene banks worldwide to fortify international supply in case of catastrophe.
The International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA)--an important gene bank based in Aleppo, Syria--was one of many worldwide that sent seeds to the Arctic for safekeeping.
"The seeds in ICARDA's care are a globally important collection with 65 percent as unique landraces and wild relatives of cereals, legumes, and forages collected from regions such as the 'Fertile Crescent' in Western Asia, the Abyssinian highlands in Ethiopia, and the Nile Valley where earliest known crop domestication practices were recorded in civilization," the Crop Trust explained in a statement released Monday.
However, due to ongoing war and conflict, research at the Aleppo facility has been destabilized.
"ICARDA managed to move its headquarters from Syria in the early days of the war, while some of its workers remained at the gene bank in Aleppo in an attempt to save the collection," the Crop Trust said last month. "The organization managed to duplicate 80 percent of its collection in Svalbard as of March this year, where the seeds were safely stored along with others from around the world."
So, ICARDA scientists asked the Svalbard vault to return their seed deposits to new research facilities in Lebanon and Morocco to allow them to continue their research.
"The gene bank in Aleppo is still operative, but the uncertain national situation impedes sufficient recultivation of seeds to meet the demand," explained an official statement from Norway's Ministry of Agriculture and Food. "ICARDA, therefore, has requested the Svalbard Global Seed Vault to return a large proportion of seed samples deposited there in a number of shipments since 2008, aiming to grow new seed supplies."
The Crop trust confirmed on Monday that 38,000 seed samples "were safely delivered to Morocco and Lebanon today, having undertaken a 10,000 kilometre roundtrip. These seeds could be key to developing new crop varieties crucial to meeting world food demands with climate change."
Meanwhile, ICARDA criticized media reports that the Aleppo facility is completely nonfunctional earlier this month, stating: "The security situation in Syria has significantly affected ICARDA's field-related activities. However, despite all difficulties, the storage facilities of its GeneBank are still operational."
"In one sense, it would be preferable if we never had to retrieve seeds from the Seed Vault, as a withdrawal signifies a significant problem elsewhere in the world," said Marta Haga, executive director of the Crop Trust. "However, we can now see that the Vault as the ultimate fail-safe works the way it was intended to do."
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.