The Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway has received seed deposits from 35
genebanks from all continents at a deposit event hosted by Norwegian Prime
Minister and co-chair of the UN group of SDG Advocates, Erna Solberg on
February 25, 2020. The seeds came from 35 international and regional
genebanks, as well as national institutions and civil society organizations.
This brings the total number of seed samples stored in the Svalbard Global
Seed Vault to more than one million, and the total number of depositors to
85.



Among them were first-time depositors Cherokee Nation (USA), the University
of Haifa (Israel), Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (Morocco),
the Julius Kühn Institute (Germany), the Lebanese Agricultural Research
Institute, the Baekdudaegan National Arboretum (South Korea), Suceava
Genebank ?Mihai Cristea' (Romania), and Kew Gardens (UK).

"This deposit event is especially timely, given that 2020 is the deadline
for meeting target 2.5 of SDG 2 on zero hunger, which calls on the
international community to safeguard the genetic diversity of crops and
livestock," said Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg. The deposit event
was the largest since the Seed Vault's opening in 2008 and the first major
deposit since the completion of a technical upgrade in 2019. The seeds
deposited included includes common staple crops and a large variety of
vegetables, herbs, and their less-used wild relatives.

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