How Norway stores doomsday bread (10 photos)

Let's take a look at the Norwegian granary "Svalbard" on the island of Svalbard - the most secure barn in the world! Here in the world seed vault, stocks of seeds are carefully stored, which should help humanity to survive in the event of a global catastrophe.







A new virtual tour that can be bought online, offers the curious access to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, where backup copies of crop seeds are stored in case of loss originals. The vault is located on a mountainside in Svalbard, the island from a remote Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. There over 1.1 million seed varieties are stored.





Svalbard permafrost helps seeds stay in frozen state, even if the cooling plant of the object, which maintains a temperature of -18 ° C, will turn off. Online tour opens to the public metal doors of a vault similar to a storage place country's gold reserves. This is a landmark moment: access to the seed vault has been banned since its discovery in 2008.



The repository contains 642 million seeds from almost all countries world, while its capacity can accommodate 2.5 billion. Most seeds are different types of food crops, 69% of of which are cereals, 9% - legumes, and the rest - fruits, vegetables, herbs, etc.

Svalbard also holds 100,000 hallucinogenic seeds. plants such as cannabis and opium, however there are no genetically modified seeds, as Norwegian law prohibits them.



Rice ranks first in storage volume: 85 million seeds, 82 million of which are Asian varieties. A the specific species with the most seeds in Svalbard is millet, a nutritious grain grown in arid regions, p. 84 millions of seeds.

Seed storage "Svalbard" is intended for reserve copying the collections of other seed banks around the world, in which valuable plant species are kept. Regional repositories help support the diversity of different plant varieties and provide seeds when needed to support agriculture. For example, in Zambia, the Community Plant Genetic Resources Center for Development Affairs of Southern Africa provides farmers with grass under the name of sorghum, which is used to make flour and can grow rapidly in dry conditions. To seed banks also more and more often are turning to help farmers adapt to the global warming. The same seeds that are stored in Svalbard must be used only in case of loss of original varieties as a result of regional or global crises - for example, in cases where 2012, the national seed bank in the Philippines was damaged in flood and subsequently destroyed by fire, and seed vaults in Afghanistan and Iraq were destroyed during the conflict.



While the permafrost surrounding the vault protects the vault from strong warming, it has recently experienced problems, because the area where it is located heats up faster than any the other is still on Earth. So, in 2017, due to unusually high winter temperature, a significant amount of melt water got into the entrance tunnel, which caused a flood. However, undamaged seeds are replaced every several decades. Three times a year, the vault also opens for accepting new designs from global organizations.



Tour of the Svalbard vault, during which you can see arctic landscapes and the vault itself, was developed by The Virtual Tour Experts (Devon, UK) in collaboration with Crop Trust in honor of the 15th anniversary of Svalbard.



Neil Henderson, owner of The Virtual Tour Experts, went to Svalbard to personally film the inside of the vault:

Filming of the Global Seed Vault in Svalbard was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” says Henderson. - But not I managed without problems, as always happens on the setin permafrost Arctic. Around all the time there were rumors rumors that nearby polar bears hide. We filmed in sub-zero temperatures around -20°C in hazardous materials suits, providing this to ensure that our equipment works properly to ensure the highest possible image quality from the air and ground.



The experience was like shooting in a James Bond movie, but the greatest reward is the knowledge that our world will receive about this important work, especially in the face of growing climate concerns.



The virtual tour offers to admire the daytime and night landscapes around the Svalbard seed vault, as well as look behind his doors. After passing through a long tunnel to the three seed chambers, users can walk through the corridors and click on individual containers to find out what's inside. Talking video guide available in several languages.

According to Henderson, the level of detail on the tour allows users to understand the important work of the Global Seed Vault Svalbard performs for our planet and humanity.