| In the Arctic wilderness sits a vault built to help withstand potential apocalyptic impacts of climate change. It just received one of the biggest deposits in its 16-year history. Instead of money or gold, the contribution was something that could prove much more valuable to mankind. More than 30,000 samples of crop seeds from 21 countries were delivered this week to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault on Norway's Spitsbergen island. The influx underscores urgent global efforts to preserve crop diversity as climate change, conflict and other supply snarls disrupt food security. Just three crops — rice, wheat and corn — provide roughly half of the world's calories. That makes diets vulnerable to climate shocks, according to Stefan Schmitz, executive director of the Crop Trust. "It is and old economist wisdom, 'Don't put all your eggs in one basket,'" said Schmitz, whose organization is providing support on preserving and depositing seeds. "But that is exactly what we are currently doing in food." Opened in 2008, the Svalbard facility acts as a backup to gene banks around the world. Dubbed the Doomsday Vault, it sits 120 meters (395 feet) into rock, helping the rooms to remain naturally frozen, and can store 4.5 million varieties of crops. It has already seen a surprisingly early withdrawal. Thanks to one of the first deposits, the vault was able to safely store some crucial varieties of wheat and pulses from the Fertile Crescent region. But after civil war stopped a gene bank in Syria from being maintained, Svalbard released some samples so that they could be regenerated and stored in Lebanon and Morocco. Gene banks — which total more than 1,000 globally — are now becoming more risk sensitive and are ramping up efforts to back up seed collections, Schmitz said in an interview.  Boxes containing seeds from all over the world inside the Global Seed Vault seed bank in Svalbard, Norway. Photographer: HELENE DAUSCHY/AFP This week's deposit contained pearl millet and groundnut relatives from India, corn and beans from Bolivia, and more than 7,000 rice samples from the Philippines. Seeds also arrived from conflict-ridden Palestine. Chad's consignment included sesame and sorghum — a particularly significant contribution considering these crop varieties are adapted to the country's harsh climate, and therefore crucial for developing crops that withstand rising temperatures and erratic rains. Many of the seeds are so called "opportunity crops," which can thrive in challenging conditions but are rarely part of peoples' meals due to changing food trends — think okra, millets and pigeon pea. "Diversity matters when it comes to climate change," Schmitz said. He was speaking from Cali, Colombia, where countries, investors and lenders have gathered for the COP16 nature summit to try to reverse the global decline of the biosphere. While much of the focus is on combatting 'biopiracy' or boosting finance, agricultural biodiversity was higher on the agenda this year, according to Schmitz. More Food for Thought Top beef producer Brazil is pressing ahead with plans to trace cattle herds as it contends with international pressure to prevent deforestation. Read Bloomberg's Big Take on how the country's poverty crisis is perpetuating the problem. —Agnieszka de Sousa in London | 
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