The Svalbard Global Seed Vault, built on Norway's island of Spitsbergen, formally opened on February 26 to receive seed samples of food plants from across the world. Norwegian prime minister Jens

custard apples belong to South America. A recent excavation in a small town in Uttar Pradesh has unearthed custard apple seeds there. The seeds date to the Neolithic era

The first consignment of seeds bound for the

DERGAON

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault opened today on a remote island in the Arctic Circle, receiving inaugural shipments of 100 million seeds that originated in over 100 countries. With the deposits ranging from unique varieties of major African and Asian food staples such as maize, rice, wheat, cowpea, and sorghum to European and South American varieties of eggplant, lettuce, barley, and potato, the first deposits into the seed vault represent the most comprehensive and diverse collection of food crop seeds being held anywhere in the world. At the opening ceremony, the Prime Minister of Norway, Jens Stoltenberg, unlocked the vault and, together with the African Nobel Peace Prize-winning environmentalist Wangari Maathai, he placed the first seeds in the vault. The President of the European Commission, Jos