

“We need to preserve this biodiversity, this crop diversity, to provide healthy diets and nutritious foods, and for providing farmers, especially smallholders, with sustainable livelihoods so that they can adapt to new conditions. “The seed vault is the backup in the global system of conservation to secure food security on Earth,” Stefan Schmitz, executive director of the Crop Trust, the Bonn-based organization which manages the vault, told Reuters. The Norwegian government recently completed a $21.7 million project to reinforce the facility’s waterproof doorways and walls and improve its cooling system. In 2017, however, water from thawing permafrost leaked into the vault’s access tunnel no seeds were damaged. Each variety packet contains an average 500 seeds, for a total capacity of 2.5 billion seeds.īuilt into the side of a mountain and surrounded by permafrost on a Norwegian island 600 miles from the North Pole, the vault is designed to stay cold even if the power fails. The facility has the capacity to store 4.5 million crop varieties from around the world. The vault now contains more than 1,050,000 seed varieties, from staple crops like maize, wheat, and rice to vegetables, herbs, and wildflowers. The vault received more than 60,000 new seed varieties this week from 35 different groups, including regional seedbanks and agricultural departments in Thailand, the United States, and Ireland universities in Costa Rica, Ethiopia, and Lebanon the Cherokee Nation, the first U.S.-based tribe to make a deposit and the estate of Britain’s Prince Charles, among others, according to The Verge. Built in Norway in 2008, the vault is meant to protect crop diversity and safeguard global food supplies in case of a catastrophe, from natural disasters and climate change to war. The first deposit will focus on the early recordings of music from Indigenous people, later followed by more modern recordings.The Svalbard Global Seed Vault in the Arctic, also known as the “doomsday vault,” has added its one millionth seed variety. The company has hopes to finish building the vault by 2022. He added that a global committee will work closely with them on the project to choose the recordings deserving of a spot in the doomsday vault, stating that the “most precious and loved” music would make the cut from bands such as The Beatles. We want the nations and regions of the world to curate what music gets deposited.” Jenkinson continued, “we don’t want to just protect a certain genre and certain era. High-density QR codes will allow for 1,000 years of preservation under the island’s surface. The vault is said to be buried 1,000 feet under a mountain and will be durable enough to survive nuclear explosions. Speaking to Billboard about the project, the managing director of The Global Music Vault, Luke Jenkinson, said: “We want to preserve the music that has shaped us as human beings and shaped our nations.” It’s almost ready for ‘business’ according to their releases. Seeds stored in the Svalbard vault, which is built right into a sandstone mountain and covered in a thick layer of permafrost, are kept at an icy minus 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 18 degrees. The seed bank is being built inside a mountain on Spitsbergen Island near the small village of Longyearbyen. The vault will explore music from the very beginning of humankind, documenting everything from Australian Indigenous recordings to songs by acclaimed bands and artists. Officially the project is named the Svalbard Global Seed Vault on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen, part of the Svalbard island group.

In collaboration with International Music Council, Elire stated that these “purpose-built capsules” would be buried deep underground. The impressive facility is a fail-safe seed storage centre, built to stand the test of time and meet the challenge of natural or man-made disasters. Deep inside the remote Platåberget mountain on the Svalbard archipelago lies the Global Seed Vault. The Global Music Vault will store “master-quality digital copies” according to Norway’s Elire Management Group, the company curating the vault. Discover the worlds doomsday vaults for seeds and data. The preservation vault will be placed on Svalbard - an archipelago off the coast of Norway, between the Scandinavian country and the North Pole that is already home the world's seed vault.

A doomsday vault is being created by a Norwegian company to catalogue the world’s best and most beloved music.
