Ensuring our future with diverse food supply World heritage seed collection makes its way from Syria to Svalbard
Beirut and Bonn, April 2014. More than 80 percent of the globally unique collection of crop genetic resources residing with the Genebank of the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) at Aleppo in Syria is now safely duplicated at the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway. With the seventh shipment of seeds arriving in the Arctic facility in March 2014, the Svalbard seed vault has received a total of 116,484 plant genetic materials so far. The latest two shipments were sent by ICARDA’s resident Genebank Team in October 2013 and February 2014 even as the difficulties continue in Syria.
- ICARDA