There’s a lot of hand-wringing global warming hysteria in this 60 Minutes piece, but the concept of a Doomsday Vault in the Arctic housing seeds from all the world’s crops, in the even of some major vegetation-destroying catastrophe is a really interesting one (you have to sit through a commercial before the video starts):
Jun
11
2008
11
2008
A Different Sort Of Ark
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I had heard of this seed vault before, but never seen a presentation with such detail. It goes to show that there are more consequences to industrialized agriculture than most people realized.
Let’s just build Titan AE instead.
Oh, and don’t let my smart-alecky geek comment fool you–the Vault sounds like a very, very prudent idea.
Don’t sweat it, Dale. A Titan AE style ship would be pretty cool too. (Yeah, I own the movie. Geeks all around.)
I have mixed feelings about the vault — yes, it’s a fantastic idea to save our rapidly vanishing agricultural heritage. At least, for those of us who like to eat.
On the other hand, I’d prefer that it was done by, you know, enabling farmers to preserve local varieties against industrial mass-produced seeds — the way these varieties came to be in the first place over the last 10,000 years.
And, the 60 Minutes piece didn’t follow the money trail. For a critical take on this, see http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7529.
Hmm … Bill Gates, the Rockefeller Foundation, and Monsanto are ponying up for this. The word’s foremost software monopolist, the money pile from the world’s first energy monopolist, and the world’s most aggressive, monopolistic, patent-pushing, gene-engineering corporation want to make a library of 100% of the world’s agricultural germplasm?
For entirely philanthropic reasons?
I hate to be all conspiracy-theoristic, but … my word, there can be some bad consequences here.
“All your seed are belong to us.”
God have mercy.
peace,
Zach
P.S.: Actually, I am working on learning seed-saving this year for my own garden…