Deep in the Arctic, settled almost 400 feet in the sandstone, lies over a million seeds, resting as protection against catastrophic events. Seeds range from rice to corn to potatoes; They are all necessary food objects (and then some) to survive the human race and maintain a variety of crops.
. Global global svalbard vault In Svalbard, Norway-located in eternal chilly, it is designed as long-term storage of seeds, and not for people immersing and beyond (staff is present only on deposit days). The last mass seed deposit was Early this yearWith over 14,000 seed samples from 22 seed banks, including 2000 with the National Gene Bank. The treasury itself is the property of the Norway of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, maintained by the Nordic Gene Bank Nordgenand collaborated with the NON -PROFIT organization ART trust. Despite this, seed deponce maintains the ownership of their seeds. With the exception of people involved in the purposes of breeding, research and education, deposons are the only ones who can withdraw them.
Despite the fact that it is a key part of many of our daily routine, coffee is not one of these crops in the treasury for one main reason: seeds cannot survive the required protection process and freezing the environment -18 ° C in this vault.
The coffee has a resistant grain, which means that “tolerates a certain loss of water, but not an extreme level that survived through orthodox seeds. Water remaining in resistant seeds creates fatal ice crystals during conventional storage” According to the Planty Protection CenterNon -profit devoted to saving uncommon plants before extinction.
Those who work in the coffee industry already know that climate change will and will continue to affect the results of crops and the source of income for people who develop them. You can now know on breeding tests and research Made to cause climate change and varieties resistant to pests. This is brief -term and is absolutely necessary for the industry.
You should also take care of long -term thinking in the seed vault. And for this way of thinking I turned to Long Now Foundation In San Francisco “a non-profit organization established in 01996 to support long-term thinking.” The “Long Now” part is the time from the last 10,000 to the next 10,000 years. I admit that a lot of their work passes through my head and it is tough for me to understand conceptual theories about time, giving ** Everything happens in the present. However, as you may have noticed, one way to change this way of thinking is Add leading zero up to a yearmaking him a five -digit year and an sanguine look at the future.
Roman Krznaric, researcher at The Long Now and author “Good ancestor: How to think long -term in a short -term world“Details Six ways of long -term thinking. One of the six is the “intergenerational justice”, in which you think about the decision and how it will affect the 7th generation ahead of us. He writes: “Such thinking is contained in the idea of” making decisions about the seventh generation “, ecological management ethics practiced among some peoples of North American Indians, such as the nation of Lakota in southern Dakota,: community decisions take part in the effects of seven generation from the present.” Do we want people from today seven generations to drink amazing – if not more – coffee?
Currently, Svalbard Seed Vault equivalent coffee is also gene banks position (Outside natural areas and in seeds of seed genes) or in place (Outdoor, natural areas in off -road genes).
Both types of gene banks are massive resources, and off -road gene banks are susceptible to natural disasters. As an example of this Dr. Sarada KrishnanPrograms director at Crop Trust, raised a typhoon on Madagascar, which destroyed the entire gene bank and illustrated the need for a backup plan. . Organization of UN food and agriculture (FAO) has standards for gene banks that include two levels of security. “One level is either in the same country in another gene bank as an international gene bank or in a regional or international center,” he explains. “And then the second level of security duplication is in the global vault of Svalbard seeds.” Which, as mentioned earlier, coffee seeds cannot be kept.
Madagascar herself, she says, has a very immense variety of over 60 species. They are not cultivated coffee, but they are Coffea Species and necessary to behave. These genetically diverse wild species can have useful genes, such as drought tolerance or disease resistance, which makes them scientists and breeding programs.
There are only four collections of coffee origin in the world, and one that is available on the international arena, i.e. Tropical Research and Teaching Agronomic Center (Catie) Gene Bank in Costa Rica.
“Catie retains the fourth most critical coffee collection around the world and outside Africa, the most diverse in the species Coffea Arabica“Explains Daniel Fernández, a specialist at Catie’s Orthodox Seed Bank.” Ninety -five percent of preserved access is in accordance with the International Treaty with Plant Genetic Resources. ” The treaty he refers to is International Treaty of Genetic Resources of Plant for Food and Agriculturewhich regulates the way plant genetic materials can be divided between breeders for research and development.
In 2017 Crop Trust and World Coffee Research published a report About the “global strategy for the protection of coffee genetic resources”, assessing current strategies and collections. About the global coffee protection system position The collections write: “The first observation is that this is not a system. The current situation is a collection of collections focused on the country, which are isolated from each other and from external users. In most involved institutions, the purpose of the collection is to protect its own breeding program.” Almost every country has its own banking programs and research programs, but this does not mean that it is available outside the country.
Another solution for coffee is cryochantication, a method including drying and cooling of seeds, and then immersing them in liquid nitrogen. Theoretically, through research and research, this can be done. In practice, it is not so effective to the level of second -level security duplication, says Krishnan. It was about 40-50% of success and tests should be carried out aged 10, 20 and 30. There is no international coffee protocol standard yet, but other resistant seeds such as sweet potatoes, Promising success in Krioconservation.
One of the largest blockers to ensure the genetic diversity of coffee exists in the future, is money. Crop Trust pulls a miniature percentage of the Denmark fund to support maintain the activities of gene banks. To overtake protection – means that support in the industry and/or monetary industry and/or monetary support is needed. According to Fernández, the best coffee scenario is an automated greenhouse, where you can control ideal environmental conditions. Of course, if money is not a problem.
Catie was created 75 years ago and as such has aging coffee trees in field banks. There They were movements To improve systems and promote varieties, but still needs a lot of work. The indirect effects of climate change have also led to “higher frequency or the appearance of critical pathogens, such as case Colletotrichum CovertibleSo their mutation in more aggressive breeds, as it was in coffee rust, “says Fernández.” In turn, conditions of high temperature and water stress caused by longer periods of lead drought for greater exhaustion, which hinders the appropriate physiological reaction to these pathogens. ” Climate change has a cascade effect, which should be solved on many fronts, and the easiest path forward on these fronts is to have financial resources.
“Many people who donate funds for researching coffee researchers-they will work for short-term profit,” explains Krishnan. You need wider thinking and we can’t afford to defend. “A one -time investment in the amount of $ 25 million in our Endowment fund can protect these four gene banks.” A handful of immense companies can easily bring $ 2-5 million. How do I know that it is feasible? The opening of UC Davis Coffee Center, which I discussed last year, was financed privately from $ 4.5 million. And World Coffee Research announced At the beginning of this year, member companies renewed a liability of $ 10 million for their research and development programs.
Orders for coffee, breeding, climate change and gene banks are far too complicated to succeed in one article – the document of the protection strategy mentioned earlier is 72 pages, and this is only a strategy – but there is no fact that we need money. Financing and long -term thinking will support and modernize set gene banks and support research. Perhaps in the future we will have something like Global Seed Vault to protect us from catastrophic events and continue to serve coffee to seven generations from now 02220.
