Somewhere north of Norway and shy of the north pole, the Svelbard Global Seed Vault opened yesterday under chilly predictions, I mean conditions. The vault is designed to be a repository for the most common global crop seeds and is located in the far north because of the cold conditions required to freeze seeds for centuries and keep the seeds viable.
According to CNN, it received an inaugural shipment of 100 million seeds yesterday and will eventually hold up to 4.5 million different varieties of seeds from around the globe.
To put it in North American perspective, it was reported that at one time there were 7,000 types of apples around the world, 6,800 of which no longer exist. That is one reported example of how crops continue to become "extinct" on a daily basis.
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