The initiative is similar to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, located on a Norwegian island in the Arctic.
The pandemic has raised poverty in Latin America to levels that have not been seen for decades, that is why in the Colombian city of Cali a “Noah’s Ark” of seeds that keeps thousands of varieties to guarantee food security around the world.
It is the “Semillas Para el Futuro” building, located on the road that leads from Cali, the third most important city in Colombia, to the Alfonso Bonilla Aragón International Airport, the main one in the southwest of the country.
A “Noah’s Ark” that will guard the “genetic wealth” of more than 67,000 different plant samples that can guarantee the food security of humanity, the director of Research in Crops for Nutrition and Health of the Bioversity Alliance explained to Efe International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), Joseph Tohme, promoters of this initiative.
Formula against poverty
Poverty and extreme poverty reached in 2020 in Latin America levels that had not been observed in the last 12 and 20 years, respectively, due to the pandemic, as revealed last March by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) .
This situation, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), is due to deficiencies in food systems that threaten the lives and livelihoods of people around the world, especially the most vulnerable and those living in fragile contexts.
The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2021 report reveals that During 2020 between 700 and 800 million people in the world suffered from hunger.
Noah’s Ark of seeds preserves biodiversity in Ecuador
These are “sad data” for CIAT, which has been based in Cali for 45 years, in an old house that was once a meat processing plant.
There they guard seeds mainly of beans, cassava and tropical forages that take countries of Eastern Africa, especially, out of food trouble; Eastern Europe, Oceania and all of America.
But their storage capacity is coming to an end, so they decided to build a place according to the technological, environmental and sustainability needs that the planet requires.
Seeds for the world
The initiative, similar to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, located on a Norwegian island in the Arctic, emerged in 2013; In 2018 the work began, with an investment of 17.2 million dollars, and in 2022 it will be put at the service of humanity.
This initiative will make it possible to conserve and distribute collections of crops that are no longer even found in nature; and it will also have spaces for research and training that allow generational renewal of agriculture.
“We have materials from hundreds of countries, but those who are in charge of their care and research are Colombians. Researchers, biologists, engineers, among others, make their contributions to the world from here ”, says proud Tohme, while pointing out that there is a smaller group of researchers of 30 nationalities.
“Noah’s Ark” stores more than half a million seeds
Wrapped in a T-shirt with seeds stamped on the back, Joseph Tohme explains that “Seeds of the Future” has the potential to improve the quality and tolerance of seeds to adverse climatic conditions such as droughts, low temperatures and floods.
Also to alleviate crises like the one that occurred in 1998 after Hurricane Mitch, which wiped out a third of the basic crops in Central America.
At that time, getting grain and sorghum for cattle became the main problem, but the old IATTC repository contributed to recover agricultural production and food security in Honduras and Nicaragua.
Fifty countries have received since 2014 a number close to 28,000 varieties of crops to solve their feeding difficulties, following the request of governments, farmers and other citizens to the IATTC.
“This donation to humanity is free of cost”, explains Marcela Santaella, operations manager of the Germoplasma building (seed bank).
Those who want to access, only have to fill out a form on the CIAT website and wait four to eight weeks; a short time if one takes into account that what is being talked about is protecting food safety in the future. (I)
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