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Scientific American

Scientific American

The Arctic Seed Vault Shows the Flawed Logic of Climate Adaptation

Scientific American
Summary
Nutrition label

70% Informative

Svalbard Global Seed Vault is an underground storage facility designed to secure seeds to “ensure that food crop varieties are not lost” in the event of a global crisis such as war, terrorism or climate change.

The vault opened in 2008 , following on an earlier iteration in which seeds were stored in a nearby coal mine.

In 2017 the vault suffered a flood caused, ironically, by climate change, threatening the safety of the seeds.

Because of this biological lag, Svalbard ’s diligently protected seeds might turn out to be useless, unable to grow or survive.

The vault's focus on seeds also neglects crucially important food crops such as cassava that are not typically propagated through seeds.

The expense of the vault makes one wonder if it is really a good use of conservation resources and scientific effort.

VR Score

78

Informative language

78

Neutral language

35

Article tone

informal

Language

English

Language complexity

48

Offensive language

not offensive

Hate speech

not hateful

Attention-grabbing headline

not detected

Known propaganda techniques

not detected

Time-value

long-living