If the authors of an apocalyptic film were considering where to place a building that is supposed to help save humanity, they would probably also consider the place where such a building really stands.
The global seed vault, which was built to protect the world‘s food supply from disaster, is planted in Arctic permafrost on the Norwegian island of Svalbard.
The bowels of the place, also nicknamed the “doomsday vault”, store more than a million samples of original and bred seeds from almost all countries of the world. If necessary, stocks of many varieties of legumes, tubers, rice, cereals or vegetables could be restored from them.
Virtual tour
The vault building, which is almost 150 meters deep and six meters high, is inaccessible to the public, which has been a breeding ground for various conspiracies for years. According to some, there were, for example, secret laboratories in its bowels, in which scientists researched how to establish food supremacy for selected countries.
Now you can look inside yourself, and you don’t even have to fly across the Arctic Ocean for it. On the occasion of the 15th anniversary of the project, its operators created a virtual tour that will guide you through the building.
“The virtual tour gives everyone the opportunity to look inside. We think it’s a general issue of transparency and accountability to the wider public,” Stefan Schmitz, executive director of the non-profit organization Crop Trust, which operates the vault together with the Norwegian authorities, told the Guardian.
“What is secured inside the Vault is one of the most important global public goods we have on Earth. But we have to protect them, secure them and make sure they are preserved forever,” adds Schmitz, adding that the climate crisis, loss of biodiversity, natural disasters and conflicts are increasingly destabilizing our food systems.
If you go to the virtual halfway point between Europe and the North Pole, you will come across boxes with Slovak samples in the safe.
Winter, polar bears and no earthquakes
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