24 Apr 2024

New Zealand adds to its seed reserves at remote global vault

From Nine To Noon, 9:35 am on 24 April 2024
Image of Kioumars Ghamkar depositing seeds at the Svalbard Global Seed Back.

Photo: AgResearch

Another batch of New Zealand's most precious pasture seeds have been delivered to a doomsday mountain vault in Norway.

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault, 120 metres inside an Arctic mountainside, has more than 930-thousand varieties of crops.

It means they can be retrieved and regrown should a disaster wipe a crucial plant species out.

Last month, seeds for ryegrass, a standard clover and a subterranean clover were sent over.

Kioumars Ghamkhar is the director of AgResearch's Margot Forde Genebank in Palmerston North - our very own, albeit smaller, seed bank.