Seeds Should Be the Least of Syria’s Worries

A large building situated in the mountainside nearly 800 miles from the North Pole holds mankind’s most important means of survival: seeds. There are over 860,000 seed samplings from across the world held in the Crop Trust Vault in Norway, which is dubbed the Noah’s Ark of food crops.

With Syria being ripped apart by civil war, they have found themselves having to withdraw over 130 boxes of the 325 they deposited. The boxes that were requested consist of wheat, barley and various grasses for dry regions of the world.

The vault has been storing seed since 2008 and less than a decade later it is already being utilized – much earlier than expected.

New story on NPR: Syrian Civil War Prompts First Withdrawal From Doomsday Seed Vault In The Arctic http://t.co/kUNz3bfo5S

— Paul (@ooTECHNOLOGYoo) September 23, 2015

The seeds were requested by the International Center for Agricultural Research, located in Beirut, and will be delivered once all the appropriate paperwork has been finalized. The Aleppo bank states it has had difficulty growing seeds and distributing them to other nations, which is what prompted the request.

With over 11 million displaced by the Syrian war and a quarter of a million dead from the fighting, it begs the question, why would you worry about seeds before ending the war?

The war isn’t over and more destruction seems imminent. It may be that Aleppo has a lot more to worry about than replacing the wheat crops.

The post Seeds Should Be the Least of Syria’s Worries appeared first on Lythyum.