Agency Increases Support to Seed Vaults
FrontLines - June 2009
By Angela Rucker
USAID will spend $7 million in 2009 to support the Global Crop
Diversity Trust, an organization that works to preserve a variety of
crops and supports gene banks like the Svalbard Global Seed Vault
in Norway.
This year’s funding comes on top of about $7.5 million the
Agency has spent since 2002 to help the Trust operate and create an
endowment to continue its work.
The Norway facility—known as the doomsday seed vault because
its frigid location is likely to withstand climactic shifts and most
disastrous scenarios—is just one of several gene banks the Agency
supports, said Rob Bertram, an agricultural expert in USAID’s Bureau
for Economic Growth, Agriculture and Trade. The goal, he said,
is “to make sure the world’s seed heritage is conserved for future
generations—especially those in developing countries and regions.”
The Agency’s interest is twofold: to ensure long-term
conservation grants are available to organizations that collect and
store a variety of seeds, and to provide assistance to gene banks
to operate at internationally accepted standards. A dozen gene
banks—from Norway to Peru—hold millions of seeds from
plants and other crops.
The Agency has a history of being closely involved in the
Trust, dating back to the early 2000s when then-Administrator
Andrew Natsios was a passionate supporter of the creation of the
Global Crop Diversity Trust to provide sustained support to longterm
conservation needs. USAID has supported international seed
banks since the 1960s.
Today, USAID works alongside more than 30 other
countries, agencies, and organizations, including the Bill and
Melinda Gates Foundation and CGIAR (Consultative Group on
International Agricultural Research). As of April, close to $152
million had been pledged by these groups and individual donors
to support the Trust’s work.
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